Christian Fundy effect on official policy: Israel, Global Warming, Stem Cell, Schiavo - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

host · 07-25-2006, 08:55 AM

Remember the spectacle, last year, of the president and almost exclusively, the republican members of the house and senate, converging on Washington in the middle of the night....on a weekend...to pass and sign legislation that targeted the fate of one brain dead woman, Terri Schiavo?

Remember when U.S. presidents worked tirelessly to broker peace between Israel and it's neighbors in the middle east?

Consider the first veto of Mr. Bush's presidency....ending the longest period in history where a sitting president did not veto a single bill.....Bush's first veto was to prevent the passage of a bill that would have overturned a ban on government funding of stem cell research.

Consider the present U.S. government environmental protection and global warming policy, vs. the sharp contrast of former V.P. Al Gore's efforts that promote totally opposite policies on these issues.

I believe that it does not matter what Bush, Cheney, Rove, Frist, or Hastert, actually believe in their hearts. It seems to me that they have channeled and mined the political support of folks possessed with what passes for "sound" biblical interpretation, today in America's heartland. This politcal "base" includes a signifigant minority (as high as 40 percent of total voters) of adult Americans who tend to vote in disproportionally high numbers.....always for republican candidates who "share" their "values".

If your politics are not driven by your religious belief in an impending "rapture", are you comfortable with the coincidence of how closely your opinions match those of Christian fundamentalists?

If I wasn't living in these times where this is actually happening, I could never imagine that the votes of folks who believe that Israel must occupy all of the land that the Israelites held in the middle east in biblical history, so that a series of events can transpire that will incinerate nearly all Israelis and their opposing neighbors, so that the faithful can suddenly and imminently be "raptured", right out of their clothing...up into heaven, to sit for eternity, at the right hand of God.....could have such a profound and damaging influence on the makeup of all three of our federal branches of government, now.

When I sit in our sunday church service, or at the holiday dinner table with my wife and her family, I am the sole person in those gatherings who is not comforted by an unquestioning belief in the certainty of the soon to come rapture.

You may reflexively dismiss all of this, but it already effects the quality of the air you breathe, the water you drink, and you and your childrens' future. Is this agenda even "American"? Is it any different from the beliefs that cause the effects of fundamentalist Islamic government?

If you observe the near total support in U.S. government, media, and society, for Israel's current military response in the middle east this month, even in it's disproportionate harshness, and the present environmental and energy policy (or non-policy) of the U.S. government, if you don't agree that it is driven by Christian fundamentalist political influence, what do you think drives both of these policies....considering that both have changed so much since 2000?

Quote:

http://www.johnstoncenter.unc.edu/ev...rrow_moyer.htm
There Is No Tomorrow
By Bill Moyers
The Star Tribune
Sunday 30 January 2005

One of the biggest changes in politics in my lifetime is that the delusional is no longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat of power in the Oval Office and in Congress....

.......These true believers subscribe to a fantastical theology concocted in the 19th century by a couple of immigrant preachers who took disparate passages from the Bible and wove them into a narrative that has captivated the imagination of millions of Americans. Its outline is rather simple, if bizarre: Once Israel has occupied the rest of its "bibli-cal lands," legions of the Antichrist will attack it, triggering a final showdown in the valley of Armageddon. As the Jews who have not been converted are burned, the messiah will return for the rapture. True believers will be lifted out of their clothes and transported to heaven, where, seated next to the right hand of God, they will watch their political and religious opponents suffer plagues of boils, sores, locusts and frogs during the several years of tribulation that follow..........

........ I've reported on these people, following some of them from Texas to the West Bank. They are sincere, serious and polite as they tell you they feel called to help bring the rapture on as fulfillment of biblical prophecy. That is why they have declared solidarity with Israel and the Jewish settlements and backed up their support with money and volunteers. That is why the invasion of Iraq for them was a warm-up act, predicted in the Book of Revelations, where four angels "which are bound in the great river Euphrates will be released to slay the third part of man." For them a war with Islam in the Middle East is something to be welcomed - an essential conflagration on the road to redemption. The rapture index - "the prophetic speedometer of end-time activity" - now stands at 153.......

........So what does this mean for public policy and the environment? As Glenn Scherer reports in the online environmental journal Grist, millions of Christian fundamentalists believe that environmental destruction is not only to be disregarded but hastened as a sign of the coming apocalypse.

We're not talking about a handful of fringe lawmakers who hold or are beholden to these beliefs. Nearly half of the members of Congress are backed by the religious right. Forty-five senators and 186 members of the 108th Congress earned 80 to 100 percent approval ratings from the three most influential Christian-right advocacy groups. They include Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Assistant Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Conference Chair Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, Policy Chair Jon Kyl of Arizona, House Speaker Dennis Hastert and Majority Whip Roy Blunt. The only Democrat to score 100 percent with the Christian Coalition was Sen. Zell Miller of Georgia, who before his recent retirement quoted from the biblical Book of Amos on the Senate floor: "The days will come, sayeth the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land." He seemed to relish the thought.

Onward Christian Soldiers

And why not? There's a constituency for it. A 2002 Time/CNN poll found that 59 percent of Americans believe that the prophecies found in the Book of Revelations are going to come true. Tune in to any of the more than 1,600 Christian radio stations or flip on one of the 250 Christian TV stations across the country and you can hear some of this end-time gospel..........

Quote:

http://www.wesleyumcnaperville.org/2...1_archive.html
Sunday, May 23, 2004

“The New Jerusalem”
Revelation 21:1- 10, 22- 22:5
A Sermon by H. Jason Reed
Wesley UMC, Naperville, IL
May 23, 2004

.......Let’s start with the end time and The Rapture as proposed by John Nelson Darby and his followers. He was a British evangelist whose story begins with a vision of a two-stage return of the Christ (as opposed to one return which we confess in our creeds) experienced by a fifteen-year-old girl named Margaret McDonald of Port Glasgow, Scotland, in 1830. <b>Darby took the vision and applied it to the Book of Daniel and to Revelation. He came up with a rational timetable based on Daniel 9:25- 27 to schedule the events mentioned in Revelation. He preached his system in America in the 1860’s. His followers founded Dallas Theological Seminary.</b>

The time line runs like this. God started the countdown for the end with Daniel but paused the stopwatch with Jesus’ birth. For two thousand years the church and the world has lived in a time of God’s “dispensation.” We live in a premillennial age prior to Christ’s victory over the forces of evil at the battle of Armageddon and the initiation of Jesus’ thousand-year reign. The end of the dispensation will occur when the nation of Israel is reconstituted. Since that began in 1948, the Rapture will soon follow.

In the Rapture true believers will, based on a questionable interpretation of I Thessalonians 4:13- 18, “meet the Lord in the air” prior to an “hour of trial” mentioned in Revelation 3:10 which the Darbyites translate as “tribulation.” To fit Daniels’ prophecy, this time of tribulation will last seven years. In that period all good Christians will be up in the clouds watching the rest of get what’s coming to us.

Am I confusing you? Good. Then you’re starting to get the picture. You see, the whole thing is a proof-text fantasy. There is no sound basis in Scripture for the Rapture or the Tribulation.

But wait, there’s more. According to the dispensationalists’ scripts these events must occur in order:
· The rebirth of the nation of Israel;
· The Rapture of born-again Christians off the earth;
· The emergence of an evil Antichrist (and his one-world currency), probably from Europe;
· The Antichrist signs a seven-year peace treaty with Israel, setting in motion the seven years of tribulation ~ but the Antichrist will break the treaty after three and one half years;
· The rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem and resumption of animal sacrifices there;
· The desecration of the temple by the evil Antichrist, followed by the second half of the seven-year period of tribulation;
· Jesus’ return in the ‘Glorious Appearing’ exactly seven years after the Rapture, beginning with his touch-down on the Mount of Olives, which will split the mountain into two.
<b>(Rossing, p. 55- 56)..........</b>

Quote:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/cus...nDate&n=283155

The Rapture Exposed: The Message of Hope in The Book of Revelation (Paperback)
by Barbara R. Rossing

Quote:

http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll...EWS10/60722016
Article published Saturday, July 22, 2006

Mideast conflict studied for links to Bible

How — or whether — the 10-day-old conflict ties in with Bible prophecy is a matter of debate in Toledo and around the globe.

“We’re getting comments from around the world,” said Todd Strandberg of Omaha, who runs the Web site RaptureReady.com. “Most of them are from the United States, but for some reason, Australia is a big one.”

<b>Mr. Strandberg, who is in the Air Force, said he works about eight hours a day, seven days a week, compiling information about the End Times — the days leading up to Earth’s final battle, Armageddon — for his Web site, which has been in operation for 20 years, since the era of dial-up online bulletin boards.</b>

“I try to be practical with everything. My main goal is not to be spectacular or push the conspiracy thing,” Mr. Strandberg said. “But God says he is coming back, so sometime he is coming back.”

The latest round of fighting in the Middle East is being closely watched for any signs of Syrian involvement — a step that some feel will lead to the destruction of its capital city, Damascus, as described by two Bible prophets.

Quote:

http://www.raptureready.com/rap2.html
Rapture Index 156
Net Change +1

Updated Jul 24, 2006

Record High 182 Record Low 57
24 Sept 01 12 Dec 93

Quote:

http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101020701/story.html
Apocalypse Now
Posted Sunday, June 23, 2002; 2:31 a.m. EST

36% of Americans believe that the Bible is the word of God and is to be taken literally
— TIME/CNN Poll

A TIME/CNN poll finds that more than one-third of Americans say they are paying more attention now to how the news might relate to the end of the world, and have talked about what the Bible has to say on the subject. <b>Fully 59% say they believe the events in Revelation are going to come true,<b> and nearly one-quarter think the Bible predicted the Sept. 11 attack....

Quote:

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/...k/4068908.html
July 24, 2006, 9:08PM
All quiet at Armageddon, but will it stay that way?
These are interesting times for End Times true believers

By ZEV CHAFETS

........"I don't know if this is the time or not," said Pastor Wilson, an American-born Pentecostal who lives in Jerusalem and specializes in keeping an eye on the End of Days. "But you can feel the breath of God from the Book of Ezekiel."

"Amen," I said, my usual response when I don't know what she's talking about.

Exactly a year ago, she and her husband, Bill, a retired brigadier general in the Georgia National Guard, took me on a tour of Armageddon. Connie read aloud obscure biblical prophecies about the apocalypse, taken from the Old Testament books of Ezekiel and Daniel and the New Testament's Book of Revelation. Later, Bill pointed out the military terrain in the Jezreel Valley, where he expects 2 billion enemy soldiers to gather against the forces of good. He wasn't sure what God's strategy would be, but applying military principles, he envisioned something like Sherman's capture of Atlanta, or so it seemed to me.

Secular liberals find this scenario preposterous. On the other hand, many of these same scoffers profoundly believe that high-octane gasoline and the profligate use of electric home appliances will heat planet Earth to a doomsday temperature last experienced 420,000 years ago..

Quote:

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/met...e.14a97df.html
S.A. pastor a champion for Israel

Web Posted: 07/22/2006 11:59 PM CDT

....He's drawn both praise and criticism from Jewish and Christian leaders for what's become his life's work.

His reach — television and radio broadcasts in 190 countries, 21 major books, plus his Cornerstone Church, with an average Sunday attendance of 8,000 to 9,000 — is undeniable.

With the release of his book, "The Jerusalem Countdown," earlier this year and fresh off a lobbying trip to Washington, D.C., Hagee has intensified his efforts to keep America allied with Israel and unify Christian support for the cause.

In an interview Friday with San Antonio Express-News Staff Writer Abe Levy, the pastor addressed his pro-Israel campaign and the latest Mideast fighting.

You've visited Israel 23 times and known Israeli prime ministers dating back to Menachem Begin. You've donated $12 million in recent years for 12,000 Russian Jews to relocate to Israel. Why?

I went to Israel for the first time in 1978 as a tourist and I came home a Zionist. I felt a very special presence of the Lord there. I felt that my spiritual roots were there. On the occasion that I was praying on the Western Wall on that visit, I turned and saw a Jewish man praying, kissing the Bible, very devotedly talking to God. I knew he was praying to the same God I was, and I knew absolutely nothing about him.

So I returned home and for three years went on a study binge to discover the Jewish roots of Christianity, to discover the history of the Jewish people from the Cross until the 20th century. I read about things I had never been taught in seminary nor any secular university from which I graduated.

Five months ago, you founded Christians United for Israel with 400 evangelical leaders. <b>The group drew 3,500 people to its first-ever summit last week in Washington D.C., and met with members of Congress. You've said this summit will be repeated yearly. What else is in store for the group?</b>

We're going to have a 'call to action' e-mail and fax. Every spiritual leader in the nation, we want to be able to communicate to them every Monday morning about the issues facing America. ... We have something over 16,500 leaders on our 'call to action' list, and some of those leaders have more than a million people on their e-mail and fax address.

We're going to have a 'Night to Honor Israel' in major cities in America just like we've been having here for 25 years. That forces Christians to become educated about the concerns of the Jewish people and for the Jewish people to get to meet a new breed of Christian that's on the streets of America.

How broad-based is Christians United for Israel? Are there other Christian groups and leaders you'd like to see join that haven't?

Israel is the only thing that every evangelical can agree on. I assure you that if you get a group of evangelicals together and start talking about the moral agendas, that there will be a dogfight in 15 minutes, because there is a plethora of opinions.

And I have said to our organization, Christians United for Israel, we represent one issue: Israel, and Israel alone.....

...That's why Jesus said in (John) 4:22 'Salvation is of the Jews.'.....

Willravel · 07-25-2006, 09:21 AM

Looking at the big picture, I think it is obvious that current decision making at the top levels of the US government are based, at least in part, on religous dogmatic teachings that have no place in the political process. Decision making based on religous clairvoiance, or knowledge of the religous future, is not only damning to the country, but is evidence of psychosis. Wasn't it Martin Luther, father of modern Protestantism, who said that if he knew God was coming tomorrow, I'd plant a tree today?

Bill O'Rights · 07-25-2006, 11:00 AM

Biased much?

Hell, I'm an athiest and I furl a brow over "Rapture Believers" and "Fundys". I do, of course use those terms, but not when trying to conduct a poll.
"Gee...which way does he expect it to go"?

"Excuse me Ma'am...which do you prefer? The taste of this delightfully refreshing carbonated softdrink...or the putrid, fetid, vile taste of this carbonated sewage waste?"

host · 07-25-2006, 11:26 AM

Bill O'Rights, I am sorry that I've done such a poor job of concealing my incredulity and outrage. I live in the midst of this, as I described in the OP.

IMO, there are two groups who share the same "politics". One has the advantage that the other is in denial of the extent of the political influence that the former has amassed, ironically, over issues that both factions have such similar opinions about.

Quote:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...071501032.html
Marching as to War
Former Air Force Officer Mikey Weinstein Zeroes In on Proselytizing in the Military

By Alan Cooperman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, July 16, 2006; Page D01

........Yet one of his favorite lines these days -- right up there with "sucking chest wounds" -- comes from the Officers' Christian Fellowship, a private organization with 14,000 active-duty members on more than 200 U.S. military bases around the world. In its mission statement, the OCF says its goal is "a spiritually transformed military, with ambassadors for Christ in uniform, empowered by the Holy Spirit.".......

......Ambassadors for Christ in uniform. To Weinstein, who is both a Jew and a member of a military family, it is an abomination. It "evokes the Crusades." He says he can't believe that generals talk like this when the United States is fighting a global war on terror and trying to win hearts and minds in Muslim countries...........

[

Seaver · 07-25-2006, 12:26 PM

Um.. so a person who leads the country according to his own morals means the loony fringe is leading the country?

I'm sorry, but you seriously need to research some of the groups you put out there. I've been to the Officer's Christian Fellowship, as well as their brother group Fellowship of Christian Athletes. None of them teach the Rapture, none of them teach how abortion is wrong, they don't do anything harmful to anyone.

You know what they DO do? they support family members of those wounded or killed in battle. They support families of members who's parents fall ill, are unemployed, etc. And on their meetings they simply have a good time, talk a little about religion, and organize fundraisers for the community.

OH THE SKY IS FALLING!

Sorry Host, but you must come to realize that close to 90% of the US is religious. And those religious people more often than not follow their beliefs on what is wrong and right. And those beliefs are more often than not carried into the ballot box.

I'm sorry I dont buy your argument that global warming, an unstable Middle East, etc., are all because a bunch of radicals are trying to bring about the apocalypse.

roachboy · 07-25-2006, 12:52 PM

seaver:

your posts no. 5 really does not make sense: either (1) christianity encompasses a wide range of beliefs, most of which have little contact with those of protestant fundamentalist groups that politically situate themselves on the extreme right or (2) all christians endorse the set of assumptions particular to fundamentalist protestant groups that politically situate themselves on the extreme right.

you post seems to argue that both are true at once.
both cant be.
whch is it, then?

Seaver · 07-25-2006, 01:10 PM

Quote:

your posts no. 5 really does not make sense: either (1) christianity encompasses a wide range of beliefs, most of which have little contact with those of protestant fundamentalist groups that politically situate themselves on the extreme right or (2) all christians endorse the set of assumptions particular to fundamentalist protestant groups that politically situate themselves on the extreme right.

you post seems to argue that both are true at once.
both cant be.
whch is it, then?

Actually it both can be, and are, true at once.

The truth is in the strength of beliefs. While almost any Jew, Christian, or Muslim believes by their faith that there will be and end time, to state that these groups are actively attempting to force the apocolypse is simply redicoulous. MAYBE there are a fringe group out there, but to claim they hold sway over the president belongs in paranoia.

So back to your question... the truth is in the scale. There are many different teachings in the Torah, Bible, and Qur'an. However not everyone stresses the same points. While the beliefs will be extremely similar in the vas amount of cases, using the same references, which are stressed are different.

So I'm changing your statement because they're not what was intended. (1) Christianity encompasses a wide range of belifs, most of these groups have little or no contact with fundamentalists group that pray for the apocolypse, and (2) most people decide their stance on issues based on what they think is morally right. These morals are often decided by their religion.

I dont get why you insist on posting "extreme right" so often, I'd like to see the number of liberal politicians who do not actively proclaim their religion.

roachboy · 07-25-2006, 01:18 PM

seaver--thanks---i took your earlier post as implying that to be a christian meant agreeing with fundamentalist protestant positions--which is simply wrong.

you can start almost anywhere and find that fundamentalist protestants are quite strange within christianity--from the assumption that the bible is literally true, through the "end times" nonsense, through the relation between religious and political beliefs.

i think it is naive to assume that christianity has any monopoly on people's ethics--i think deeply religious people might prefer to think that is true--but it really isnt. you might think about the enormous phenomenon that is the catholic church in america, its problematic relations with rome, the huge diversity of political positions elaborated in/through catholicism directly and indirectly--you cant really say much of anything about catholics being of one mind politically about anything--nor can you say that the ways catholics map their religious beliefs onto politics is necessarily direct.

i emphasize extreme right politics when i refer to fundamentalist protestant groups because--well---it's true.
i dont use it to refer to all of christianity because that would be stupid.

Elphaba · 07-25-2006, 01:53 PM

Quote:

A 2002 Time/CNN poll found that 59 percent of Americans believe that the prophecies found in the Book of Revelations are going to come true. Tune in to any of the more than 1,600 Christian radio stations or flip on one of the 250 Christian TV stations across the country and you can hear some of this end-time gospel..........

I was startled to see that more than half of Americans believe in the prophecies. As seaver and roachboy have discussed, there is no reason to believe that this group is homogeneous in the expression of their belief. It does make a clear point as to why the Republican party must attract and retain this base. From this perspective, the notion that the base is driving the party and it's policies becomes quite logical. I would hope that the extreme members of this group would not have that great of influence on the party.

Seaver · 07-25-2006, 02:11 PM

Roach, I'm not saying that religion has a monopoly on morals. As many of my personal moral beliefs are in staunch opposition to my religion (pre-marital sex, homosexuality, etc).

That is why I formed my statement the way I did.

Quote:

most people decide their stance on issues based on what they think is morally right. These morals are often decided by their religion.

roachboy · 07-25-2006, 02:30 PM

seaver: if that's true, then it would follow that one can oppose the influence of a particular sector of christianity over public life and not be saying anything about the general relaton of religion--or even of christianity as a whole--to politics. nor would the argument speak to any general question of morality/ethics and their relations to politics. the op was not "how horrible it is that christians have any role on government" but rather posed questions about the (apparent) public acceptance of positions drawn from a very narrow range of christian beliefs--one that happens to work as part of the populist coalition that is the conservative mass base--that is fundamentalist or evangelical protestant churches.

no time at the moment for more.

Willravel · 07-25-2006, 07:20 PM

I belive (religously) that the population of the earth should be reduced by roughly 1000 times. If I were to become president, and I formulate all my decisions starting with the question, "How will this reduce the population of the eart?", how good of a president would I be? Pretty crappy?

Religion is good beans so long as one uses it responsibly. Opening the good book every time a decision needs to be made isn't just irresponsible, it's a theocracy. We don't live in a theocracy (or at elast we aren't supposed to). The idea is that the state is run by those that have the best interest of all people in mind, and that one of the best interests of the people is to have free religion. While Christianity (all religions, really) come with a set of nifty morals, the broader consideration should always be made. Imagine that you are a Muslim in a country rules by Christians who only rule in favor of Christianity. Imagine that you are a Christian in a country rulsed by Muslims that base all decisions on Islam. The fact that religion is so varied alone should make it obvious that decision making on a federal scale is absurd. WWJD should not be a t-shirt the President should wear, or a philosophy he should follow (though it'd be better than what he's doing now...I doubt Jesus would have invaded Iraq).

What wouldn't Jesus do?

powerclown · 07-25-2006, 08:10 PM

According to you, Israel, JINSA and the Jews run American foreign policy.
Now you're saying the fundamentalist Christians run American foreign policy.

Not a big religion guy, are you host?

Willravel · 07-25-2006, 08:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by powerclown

According to you, Israel, JINSA and the Jews run American foreign policy.
Now you're saying the fundamentalist Christians run American foreign policy.

Not a big religion guy, are you host?

It's a matter of the level of influence. I imagine that all religous people make *some* decisions based on their religous morality. I've done it. Several times, even. The problem is that the idea of the president is the idea that someone will be able to succesfully run the executive branch in the best interest of his or her constituants...the American people. Now of course there is going to be *some* influence on a president. Yes, big $$$ and more power everywhere is going to eventually tempt someone in a high position of power. The problem is when the president sells to the highest bidder. I can accept a certian level of corruption. I'm not stupid; all government is corrupt in some way or another. Eventually, there has to be a line crossed where one has to make the decision whether it's become harmful. I think we can agree that this is no longer a safe level of corruption. Can we agree on that?

host · 07-26-2006, 01:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by powerclown

According to you, Israel, JINSA and the Jews run American foreign policy.
Now you're saying the fundamentalist Christians run American foreign policy.

Not a big religion guy, are you host?

powerclown, I've read posts on this forum where you have engaged roachboy, and....even me, in detailed, "back 'n forth" discussion. Later, I learned on the page, linked below, that you and I don't speak the same language:
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...t=97588&page=3

I'm trying to figure out what the fuck is behind what I see as going "terribly wrong" in my country, powerclown. By posting here, I'm sharing what I've found.....kind of thinking "out loud".....displaying some things that shape "what I think I know..." I probably don't know as much as most other people.

If you don't want to participate in a discussion with me, that's fine, but please don't come here and post like you did above.....

It isn't me who is posting "on the fringe" ideas, powerclown. The president has the "on the fringe" title locked up....his appointments demonstrate that he owns that distinction. We're closer to six years into this freakish Bush era, than we are to five, and there's enough of a track record showing, to support my point:

Remember the first man appointed by Bush, before he picked Jerry Bremer, to run the Provisional Authority in post invasion Iraq? It was JINSA Jake Garner:

Quote:

http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/...arner.profile/
Garner seeks to reprise his success

By Patrick Cooper
CNN
Monday, May 19, 2003 Posted: 11:11 AM EDT (1511 GMT)

(CNN) -- Retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Jay Garner has returned to the Pentagon, but the timing of his return to Iraq is yet to be determined.

Garner is eventually to become the "interim transitional civil administrator" of Iraq -- a title as carefully worded as any.

Now biding his time in Kuwait, he is set to take on the tenuous diplomatic role of transitioning Iraq to a new civilian government.

........One wildcard issue will be Garner's signing of an October 2000 statement blaming Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority for ongoing violence in Israel.

<b>Dozens of retired American military officers signed the statement, produced in conjunction with the Washington-based Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs. Garner also earlier attended a JINSA-led trip to Israel.</b>

Although Iraq and Israel historically have been hostile JINSA issued a statement in late March defending Garner's trip:

"The idea that 10 days in the company of JINSA, traveling in a democratic and friendly country, would fundamentally alter his understanding of the requirements of American policy in Iraq is ludicrous and highly offensive."

Quote:

http://afa.gazette.com/fullstory.php?id=4838
Visitors board says bias complex (04/09/05)

AFA religious training modeled

By PAM ZUBECK THE GAZETTE

Religious bias will continue to pose challenges for the Air Force Academy because it's an issue society as a whole is struggling to resolve, the head of an oversight board said Friday.

"Society right now is going through a real debate," said James Gilmore, Virginia's former governor. "I'm just warning you this is going to be more difficult than you think it is.".....

.....Diverse religious beliefs should be accommodated when possible, he said, although the mission always comes first.

<h3>"Evangelical Christians do not check their religion at the door," Gilmore said. "I think that is not understood in American society,</h3> and as a result we're seeing a lot of condemnation of evangelical Christians because they are seen to be aggressively asserting themselves, and when it's in a governmental context, it's seen as an impingement on people."

<b>Does this seem like a guy who should have been promoted to a 3 star and put in charge of "defense for intelligence and warfighting support"? Do you think that Rumsfeld promoted and transfered Gen. Boykin without input from Cheney or Bush?</b>

Quote:

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/early...anizes_ag.html
And then there's probably the longest-serving officer in one assignment in bureaucratic history: Lt. Gen. William G. (“Jerry”) Boykin. He has deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence and warfighting support since July 23, 2003. Maybe Boykin is indispensable, maybe he is so good at his job that Rumsfeld can't stand to let him go.

More likely, Rumsfeld can't stand the battle that would ensue if he nominated the famous Boykin, known for his religious devotion (he was once a vociferous speaker on the Christian circuit) for another job or another star.

In other words, it's perfectly okay to keep Boykin in his job for three years -- a military eternity -- to avoid political trouble and oversight. When it comes to actually fighting the war -- if any of these generals and admirals can actually be labeled fighting -- on the other hand, year long or shorter assignments seem perfectly routine. What a way to run a railroad.

Quote:

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/20/po...rint&position=
August 20, 2004
General Said to Be Faulted Over Speeches
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

ASHINGTON, Aug. 19 (AP) - A Pentagon investigation has concluded that a senior intelligence officer violated regulations by failing to make it clear that he was not acting in an official capacity when, in speaking at churches, he cast the war on terrorism in religious terms, a Defense Department official said Thursday.

In most instances the officer, Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin, was wearing his Army uniform.

The inquiry, by the Defense Department's deputy inspector general, found that General Boykin, deputy under secretary of defense for intelligence, had also violated Pentagon rules by failing to obtain advance clearance for his remarks, which gained wide publicity through news reports last fall.

In one appearance, according to those reports, General Boykin told a religious group in Oregon that Islamic extremists hated the United States "because we're a Christian nation, because our foundation and our roots are Judeo-Christians.''

Discussing a 1993 battle by American soldiers against a Muslim warlord in Somalia, he told an audience: "I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol."

He also declared in one of his speeches that the enemy in the antiterrorism fight was Satan and that God had put President Bush in the White House.

The report on the Boykin investigation has not been publicly released. Its findings were described Thursday by a senior Pentagon official familiar with its conclusions.

The report says that in considering possible action against the general, the Army should take into account that he consulted military lawyers in advance about the propriety of making the speeches and was not advised against doing so.

The Washington Post, which reported the conclusion of the investigation on Thursday, said <b>the inquiry had determined that General Boykin discussed his involvement in the war on terrorism at 23 religious-oriented events beginning in January 2002 and that he wore his uniform while speaking at all but two. He spoke mostly at Baptist or Pentecostal churches.</b>

Quote:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/...in643650.shtml
The Holy Warrior
General Called a Religious Fanatic Finally Speaks Out

Sept. 15, 2004

<b>.......But President Bush received so much heat about Boykin from Muslim leaders that even he took a shot at the general: “Gen. Boykin’s comments don’t reflect the administration’s comments. … He doesn’t reflect my point of view.”
</b>
“That was a painful moment, but I put it in perspective,” said Boykin of Mr. Bush’s comments. “What the president heard was what was portrayed in the media. The president didn’t hear my presentation.”

Boykin tried to end the controversy by asking for an investigation by the Pentagon’s inspector general. Ten months later, the investigation concluded that he had violated department regulations by failing to clear his comments in advance.

The secretary of the Army is expected to issue Boykin a letter of concern, which amounts to nothing more than a mild slap on the wrist. That closes the investigation, <b>but doesn't address the central question of whether a senior officer, wearing his uniform, should speak so openly about his faith.</b> And that leaves the controversy right back to where it began when this self-described holy roller took to the pulpit.

Why did he start speaking to church groups? “I was asked to come and talk to Americans, many of which had their sons and daughters mobilized and involved in this war,” says Boykin. “So my purpose was to be an encouragement to Americans while we were at war.”

In churches all across the country, Boykin told riveting stories of how God sustains Americans in battle. “Before we launched that first mission, we all prayed 'God go with us. God keep your hands on us,'” said Boykin in one speech.

He tells the congregation that when he was a young captain, <b>God actually spoke to him, telling him to join the Army’s elite Delta Force: “There are times when God speaks to you in an audible voice. He spoke to me that morning because I said, ‘Satan is gathering his forces.’ He said, ‘Yes, son, but so am I.’ And I knew I was to be there.”</b>
Boykin has been on the front lines of the battle against radical Muslims for a quarter of a century, ever since Islamic revolutionaries seized the U.S. embassy in Tehran and took Americans hostage. He was one of the Delta Force commandos who went in to rescue them. The mission ended in failure on a remote desert airstrip when a helicopter ran into a transport plane full of soldiers.

“It was a huge ball of fire. They could not survive,” recalls Boykin.

It was a disaster military, but in Boykin’s telling, it was also a miracle: “That aircraft was going to explode any moment. But as I prayed in the name of Jesus, the door of that aircraft opened and through those flames came 45 men running just as hard as they could.”

That’s not just a war story that gets better with each retelling. It’s exactly what happened...........

Do the following news reports concerning the Air Force academy describe events and a climate that seems "normal" in one of the three most prestigious military academies in the world?

Quote:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...051201740.html
Air Force Removes Chaplain From Post
Officer Decried Evangelicals' Influence

By T.R. Reid
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 13, 2005; Page A04

DENVER, May 12 -- An Air Force chaplain who complained that evangelical Christians were trying to "subvert the system" by winning converts among cadets at the Air Force Academy was removed from administrative duties last week, just as the Pentagon began an in-depth study of alleged religious intolerance among cadets and commanders at the school.

"They fired me," said Capt. MeLinda Morton, a Lutheran minister who was removed as executive officer of the chaplain unit on May 4. "They said I should be angry about these outside groups who reported on the strident evangelicalism at the academy. The problem is, I agreed with those reports."....

Quote:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...062200598.html
Intolerance Found at Air Force Academy
Military Report Criticizes Religious Climate but Does Not Cite Overt Bias

By Josh White
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 23, 2005; Page A02

........He said his group, which visited the academy over four days in early May, was there to "take the pulse" of the religious climate, not to investigate wrongdoing.

Examples of questionable behavior highlighted in the report included the school's head football coach hanging a "Team Jesus" banner in the locker room in November 2004; the academy's commandant sending out a schoolwide message on the National Day of Prayer and encouraging cadets to use the "J for Jesus" hand signal; and senior school personnel signing on to a Christian advertisement citing scripture in the base newspaper.

Also detailed in the report was an incident in February 2004, when cadets reported their peers had placed fliers on the more than 4,000 place settings at the cadet dining facility and in other common areas promoting the film "The Passion of the Christ."

"Cadets felt they were being proselytized and pressured to see the movie," the report said. "Jewish cadets told the team they encountered anti-Semitic comments that they believe 'The Passion of The Christ' flyer event inspired."

Cadets also reported being harassed for not taking part in voluntary prayer meetings during basic training and being labeled as instead taking part in the "Heathen Flight" back to dorms for time to relax.

The concerns about religious intolerance arose during earlier investigations of complaints that sexual harassment was common on the campus but were ignored by school administrators. The teams studying the academy heard stories of favoritism toward evangelical cadets and faculty members and allegations of discrimination against others...........

powerclown, if none of the above causes you concern, if you thought that it was "normal" for the POTUS and nearly the entire republican congressional membership of the house and the senate to converge on Washington in a rare weekend session to pass and sign a bill into law that attempted to remove the custodial, marital rights of one man to decide what was best medically for his wife who was for a decade in a chronic vegetative state, if the fact that both VP Cheney and John Bolton were affiliated with JINSA, not to mention the roster of PNAC and it's influence in the Pentagon, seems out of the ordinary, consider this:

Quote:

http://www.villagevoice.com/news/042...n,53582,1.html
The Jesus Landing Pad
Bush White House checked with rapture Christians before latest Israel move
by Rick Perlstein
May 18th, 2004 10:00 AM

It was an e-mail we weren't meant to see. Not for our eyes were the notes that showed White House staffers taking two-hour meetings with Christian fundamentalists........Most of all, apparently, we're not supposed to know the National Security Council's top Middle East aide consults with apocalyptic Christians eager to ensure American policy on Israel conforms with their sectarian doomsday scenarios.

But now we know.

"Everything that you're discussing is information you're not supposed to have," barked Pentecostal minister Robert G. Upton when asked about the off-the-record briefing his delegation received on March 25. Details of that meeting appear in a confidential memo signed by Upton and obtained by the Voice.

The e-mailed meeting summary reveals NSC Near East and North African Affairs director Elliott Abrams sitting down with the Apostolic Congress and massaging their theological concerns. Claiming to be "the Christian Voice in the Nation's Capital," the members vociferously oppose the idea of a Palestinian state. They fear an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza might enable just that, and they object on the grounds that all of Old Testament Israel belongs to the Jews. Until Israel is intact and Solomon's temple rebuilt, they believe, Christ won't come back to earth.

Abrams attempted to assuage their concerns by stating that "the Gaza Strip had no significant Biblical influence such as Joseph's tomb or Rachel's tomb and therefore is a piece of land that can be sacrificed for the cause of peace."

Three weeks after the confab, <b>President George W. Bush reversed long-standing U.S. policy, endorsing Israeli sovereignty over parts of the West Bank in exchange for Israel's disengagement from the Gaza Strip.....</b>

powerclown, my purpose here, and in every post I compose, is to persuade others to question what they think that they "know". To me, it seemed odd that the U.S. transitioned so rapidly from being recognized as an "honest broker" in keeping diplomacy alive in the middle east, to the reduced influence that the U.S. now seems to display.....openly supporting only Israel.

If nothing else, this seems a strategy that ignores the reality that 30 percent of the world's petroleum comes from that region, and that the U.S. has never been more dependent on an uninterrupted supply of imported petroleum, than it seems to be today. I think that we in the U.S. are going to experience fuel shortages and declining dollar purchasing power, much sooner than we recognize, because of these misguided religious influences on our government.
The first step to possibly reversing the disproportionate and harmful religious influence/Israeli lobby is to identify it, and raise awareness about these influences that seem to be counter to our national self interests.

powerclown · 07-26-2006, 07:08 AM

In America, you have a majority of people who are white and Christian. You are inevitably going to get political involvement and influence from these people. What I question, though, is the immediate leap to radicalizing these people's influence and motives. Isn't there such thing as moderate, responsible, reasonable Christians? Why are all religious people (who run the entire spectrum of orthodoxy and observance) automatically branded as Taliban-like, fire-breathing radicals? Is it the phenomenon of internet communication? Is it the high-profile idiocy of certain irresponsible, egomanical televangelists?

Sorry I don't see the merit of recklessly and arbitrarily bouncing around in an attempt to study the situation - from religion to religion - from event to event - from issue to issue. Also, I believe that framing complex issues in highly emotional and incendiary language only clouds the issue, promotes divisiveness, closes people's minds, and pushes them further away from the truth - or at least a civil conversation.

----

PHILADELPHIA: The Surprising Spectrum of Evangelicals
By Paul Nussbaum
Staff Writer
THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER

PHILADELPHIA (June 19, 2005)--The only bumper sticker on the Rev. Ted
Haggard's red pickup truck proclaims: Vote for Pedro.

Haggard, founder and senior minister of the 11,000-member New Life
Church in Colorado Springs, is president of the National Association of
Evangelicals. Pedro is Pedro Sanchez, the inscrutable candidate for
class president in the screwball comedy movie Napoleon Dynamite.

This is not the politics usually associated with evangelical Christians.

Frequently portrayed as uniformly reactionary or fundamentalist,
evangelicals - drawing increased attention because of their pivotal role
in the 2004 election - are actually an amalgam of unpredictable,
sometimes contradictory, strains of Christianity across a broad spectrum
of the nation.

And many evangelicals are interested in far more than the hot-button
issues of abortion and homosexual marriage often used to define them.
Evangelicals have been active in seeking increased aid for Africa,
fighting poverty, battling the traffic in sex slaves, and supporting
efforts to reduce global warming.

Evangelicals are not just Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell and George W.
Bush. They are also Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton and the Rev. Dr.
Martin Luther King Jr.

And Haggard. And the Rev. Rick Warren, the California preacher who wrote
The Purpose Driven Life, which has sold 23 million copies since 2002.
And Ron Sider, founder of Evangelicals for Social Action in Wynnewood.

"Evangelical does not mean any specific political ideology," said
Haggard, a conservative who talks regularly with President Bush and met
earlier this month in Washington with British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

"I think the power base is shifting," said Haggard, who sees a new
generation of leaders less bombastic and more socially active than
televangelists such as Falwell and Robertson. "We think differently than
the previous generation, the 1980s Moral Majority crowd."

Most Americans consider religion an important part of their lives (83
percent say it is "very" or "fairly" important). But there is no
consensus, even among evangelicals, on how to translate faith into
action.

"The vast majority in the evangelical center are regularly embarrassed
by what Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson say, but they don't go around
issuing press releases attacking them," said Sider, author of Rich
Christians in an Age of Hunger.

The National Association of Evangelicals, which represents 30 million
evangelicals, last year adopted a new manifesto for social engagement,
For the Health of the Nation: An Evangelical Call to Civic
Responsibility, cowritten by Sider. In it, the group spells out a broad
agenda: "To protect the vulnerable and poor, to guard the sanctity of
human life, to further racial reconciliation and justice, to renew the
family, to care for creation, and to promote justice, freedom and
peace."

"God measures societies by how they treat the people at the bottom," the
document states.

Broadly defined, evangelicals are Christians who have had a personal or
"born-again" religious conversion, believe the Bible is the word of God,
and believe in spreading their faith. (The term comes from Greek; to
"evangelize" means to preach the gospel.) The term is typically applied
to Protestants.

Millions of Americans fit the definition, although estimates vary on
exactly how many. Forty-two percent of Americans described themselves as
evangelical Christians in a Gallup poll in April, while 22 percent said
they met all three measures in a Gallup survey in May. The National
Association of Evangelicals says about 25 percent of adult Americans are
evangelicals. Larry Eskridge, associate director of the Institute for
the Study of American Evangelicals at Wheaton College, puts the figure
about 33 percent.

"If you're talking about 33 percent of the population, they're not this
'other.' They're your next-door neighbor," Eskridge said.

And, like many neighbors, evangelicals can be maddeningly difficult to
categorize.

They are Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians and other mainline
Protestants, as well as Southern Baptists and members of
nondenominational mega-churches. Without a uniform theology, they vary
widely in interpretations of the Bible and its application to their
lives and nation.

With these and other strands of evangelical Christianity, "sometimes the
most visible and those who shout the loudest are considered the core,"
said Bishop C. Milton Grannum, minister of New Covenant Church of
Philadelphia, most of whose 3,000 members are African American. "But
there are thousands of African American and Hispanic churches that are
evangelical, and they should not feel threatened by the fact that they
are not as visible."

Black evangelicals are often "charismatics," a trait shared with
Pentecostals and many other evangelicals. Charismatics believe the
active influence of the Holy Spirit is evident in such practices as
faith healing and speaking in tongues.

Despite a common ground of Scripture and tradition, various evangelical
congregations often inhabit parallel universes, with different
priorities, experiences and politics.

"There's a difference in the way we identify politically because there
is a difference in the way we identify, period," said Grannum of black
evangelicals. "We have had totally different experiences... . The church
reflects the larger community."

Edmund Gibbs, a professor at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena,
Calif., said the popularity of right-wing politics is overstated.

"Many of us who consider ourselves to be evangelical Christians would
want to distance ourselves from that kind of alignment," said Gibbs, an
Episcopalian. "And it is very much an American thing; most evangelicals
in Europe would distance themselves from the politics associated with
evangelicals in the United States."

Haggard said his mission is to broaden the movement's base and its
vision.

"My role is to help the various members of the body to respect each
other and work together... to make life better for everybody."

Many Faces of Evangelicalism

Fundamentalists: They reject the theory of evolution, believe in the
literal accuracy of the Bible, regard Catholics as non-Christians, and
believe in separating themselves from the secular world. They do not
seek to change the culture through legislation. The number of
fundamentalists "is very small," said Jonathan Pait, spokesman for Bob
Jones University, a fundamentalist college in Greenville, S.C. Larry
Eskridge, associate director of the Institute for the Study of American
Evangelicals at Wheaton College, estimates the number at "several
million."

Traditionalists: They are characterized by efforts to maintain
traditional beliefs and practices in the face of a changing society.
Predominantly Republican (70 percent, compared with 10 percent
independent and 20 percent Democrat), this group of white Protestants,
with well-developed conservative political connections and ambitions, is
closest to the popular notion of the "religious right." They represent
about 12.6 percent of the population, or about 28 million adults,
according to last year's National Survey of Religion and Politics by the
Bliss Institute of the University of Akron.

Centrists and modernists: They are less tradition-oriented and more
willing to adapt their beliefs and practices. They are more likely to
identify themselves as Democrats or independents than as Republicans.
They represent about 13.7 percent of the population, according to the
Bliss survey, about 30 million people.

Black evangelicals: Most of the nation's 21 million black Protestants
fit the evangelical definition, but their politics are the reverse of
the white traditionalists: 71 percent identify themselves as Democrats
and 11 percent as Republicans, according to the Bliss survey.

Hispanic evangelicals: Many of the six million Hispanic Protestants are
converts from Catholicism, and they skew slightly toward Democratic
politics.

Catholic evangelicals: This counterintuitive term identifies Roman
Catholics who embrace much of the public-witness style of evangelical
Protestants. "They have the fire and zeal usually associated with
evangelicals," said William Portier, a religious studies professor at
the University of Dayton and the author of the recent essay, "Here Come
the Evangelical Catholics." Portier estimates the number of evangelical
Catholics at 10 percent to 20 percent of the under-40 Catholic population.

Aladdin Sane · 07-26-2006, 09:03 AM

The way this issue was framed makes it more appropriate for Tilted Paranoia. Some people see the devil behind every political liberal, while others dress him up as a Christian fundamentalist who wants to destroy the environment.

roachboy · 07-26-2006, 09:49 AM

this is becoming ridiculous really quickly.
it is empirically the case that a very significant element of the populist coalition the right has assembled is geared around the chrisitan coalition and that ralph reed was fundamental to transforming this from an umbrella organization started by jerry falwell into an extremely effective grassroots political machine. it is also obviously the case that the election of extreme right republicans owes much to the efficacy of this machine. there is nothing paranoid about this--it is simply a fact.

the christian coalition's success relies upon several factors: central among these is that it is routine in evangelical land to draw no clear distinction between questions of faith and questions of politics. given the deference accorded to folk who speak with some assurance on spiritual/political matters within the congregations, the effect of this blurring of lines can be kinda authoritarian if you think about it.
one of the central arguments the coalition has advanced internally is that a preacher is a preacher and an independent political agent at once and that there is no need to keep the two functions separate. look for yourself--look at the coalition webpages.

the christian coalition has been pretty innovative in exploiting this blurring of lines for its own ends: it publshes voter guides for each election that tell the faithful how to vote...it sponsors a range of lobbying activities and routinely generates cash that it streams toward reactionary candidates.

http://www.cc.org/about.cfm

the coalition has been a significant element in fashioning and enabling to function the various "wedge issues" that the right has used to generate and maintain a sense of (persecuted) separateness--the effects of which you see in nearly every thread here.

it is a very large, very well-funded and politically significant group, if you want to look analytically at what remains of the right after 6 years of george w bush.

one can argue with host's staging of the effects of this relationship, but you cannot do as powerclown appears to be trying to do and as aladin sane simply echoes and discount the relationship between extreme rightwing protestant evangelical/fundamentalist churches and the extreme right wing of the republican party.

Bill O'Rights · 07-26-2006, 10:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

the christian coalition has been pretty innovative in exploiting this blurring of lines for its own ends: it publshes voter guides for each election that tell the faithful how to vote...it sponsors a range of lobbying activities and routinely generates cash that it streams toward reactionary candidates.

Innovative? I don't think so. How does this really differ from any other special interest group. Besides the fact that they already have a "pre-packaged" audience in the congregation?

They're pushing their agenda. So what? I'd expect no less.
Bear in mind, the true Bible thumpers are a minority. Most Christians (the ones that I know, anyway) are not anywhere near that venomous. What the Fundamentalists do have going for them is that the're extremely vocal. If the "majority" is going to remain apathetic, then they deserve what they get.

This message has been brought to you by an atheist in the Bible belt. You may now return to your regulary scheduled bickering.

host · 07-26-2006, 11:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by powerclown

.....Sorry I don't see the merit of recklessly and arbitrarily bouncing around in an attempt to study the situation - from religion to religion - from event to event - from issue to issue. Also, I believe that framing complex issues in highly emotional and incendiary language only clouds the issue, promotes divisiveness, closes people's minds, and pushes them further away from the truth - or at least a civil conversation.

----

PHILADELPHIA: The Surprising Spectrum of Evangelicals
By Paul Nussbaum
Staff Writer
THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER

PHILADELPHIA (June 19, 2005)--The only bumper sticker on the Rev. Ted
Haggard's red pickup truck proclaims: Vote for Pedro.

Haggard, founder and senior minister of the 11,000-member New Life
Church in Colorado Springs, is president of the National Association of
Evangelicals. Pedro is Pedro Sanchez, the inscrutable candidate for
class president in the screwball comedy movie Napoleon Dynamite.

This is not the politics usually associated with evangelical Christians......

powerclown, if by "highly emotional and incendiary language", you are reacting to the thread title, I decided to shorten "FUNDAMENTALISTS", to "FUNDYS", because of the character count constraints of thread titles.
In hindsight, if it would have avoided the distraction from what I consider the well supported points that I posted, after the title, and avoided putting the status of the thread itself in jeopardy, I would have dropped one of the fundamentalist influenced issue labels from the title, instead.

Aside from that, IMO, the OP is well documented enough to withstand your "language" description. The focus here should be on the fact that people are losing their lives as a direct result of these intentional, abrupt, and counter-productive U.S. government policy shifts, in much greater numbers and frequency than before these shifts were executed, because a decision has been made to forego diplomacy in favor of military aggression, by the U.S. and by Israel, and to down play or eliminate concern for environmental protection and enforcement, in favor of the priorities inserted by lobbyists paid by the short term profit increases of the formerly more EPA regulated industries.

My focus is on why these policy shifts are happening. Far from being classified as "paranoid", "findings" similar to mine, are reported in the MSM, ironically, this prominent coverage of the Ted Haggard in the article in powerclown's last post can be found here:

Quote:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9830808/
A religious revolution in America
'Tom Brokaw Reports: In God They Trust' explores why so many Americans are turning to this expression of faith FREE VIDEO

• ‘In God They Trust’
In the upcoming “Tom Brokaw Reports: In God They Trust,” to be broadcast on Friday, Oct. 28 8 p.m., Brokaw explores why so many Americans are turning to this expression of faith, and asks whether or not some Evangelicals are going too far. Watch a preview.

By Tom Brokaw
NBC News
Updated: 10:26 a.m. ET Oct 28, 2005

For some time now I've been intrigued by the growing presence and power of the evangelical Christian movement in American politics, particularly in presidential election years. <h3>I concluded there was an acute shortage of reporting on WHY so many Americans were getting involved in the evangelical church and how they were treated by the political establishment.
</h3>
We chose the New Life church in Colorado Springs, Colorado, as the primary site for our report because its pastor, Ted Haggard, is president of the National Association of Evangelicals, and because it is emblematic of the expanding place of so called mega-churches in America.

Also, New Life is close to the U.S. Air Force Academy which has been embroiled in controversy over the place of evangelical Christianity in the ranks and faculty at the academy........

<b>Consider that the following is a news article, not an "op-ed" piece.</b> It seems to explain how the U.S. and Israel came to be in the positions that they are today in the middle east, vs. the current violence in Iraq, Gaza, and in Lebanon. Consider John Bolton's current responsibilities;
in the context of his recess appointment by Mr. Bush to UN ambassador, after he failed to win confirmation to the that position, by the republican controlled senate, and Bolton's participation in Richard Perle's 1996 "study group", described below, that issued a report that stated:

Quote:

Israel should insist on Arab recognition of its claim to the <b>biblical land of Israel,</b> the 1996 report suggested, and should "focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq."

I could have written the following article, powerclown, but I've never seen it before today.

Quote:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp...45652-2003Feb8
Bush and Sharon Nearly Identical On Mideast Policy

By Robert G. Kaiser
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, February 9, 2003; Page A01

Running for reelection last month, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel repeatedly boasted of the "deep friendship" he has built with the Bush administration -- "a special closeness,"....

Sharon was describing what his American supporters call the closest relationship in decades, perhaps ever, between a U.S. president and an Israeli government. "This is the best administration for Israel since Harry Truman [who first recognized an independent Israel]," <b>said Thomas Neumann, executive director of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs,</b> a think tank that promotes strategic cooperation with Israel as vital to U.S. security interests.
<h3>host inserts: Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs= JINSA</h3>

For the first time, a U.S. administration and a Likud government in Israel are pursuing nearly identical policies. Earlier U.S. administrations, from Jimmy Carter's through Bill Clinton's, held Likud and Sharon at arm's length, distancing the United States from Likud's traditionally tough approach to the Palestinians. But today, as Neumann noted, Israel and the United States share a common view on terrorism, peace with the Palestinians, war with Iraq and more. Neumann and others said this change was made possible by the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and their aftermath.

The Bush administration's alignment with Sharon delights many of its strongest supporters, especially evangelical Christians, and a large part of organized American Jewry, according to leaders in both groups, who argue that Palestinian terrorism pushed Bush to his new stance. <b>But it has led to a freeze on diplomacy in the region that is criticized by Arab countries and their allies, and by many past and current officials who have participated in the long-running, never-conclusive Middle East "peace process."</b>

"Every president since at least Nixon has seen the Arab-Israeli conflict as the central strategic issue in the Middle East," said Samuel R. "Sandy" Berger, President Bill Clinton's national security adviser. "But this administration sees Iraq as the central challenge, and . . . has disengaged from any serious effort to confront the Arab-Israeli problem."

The turning point came last June, when Bush embraced Sharon's view of the Palestinians and made Yasser Arafat's removal as leader of the Palestinian Authority a condition of future diplomacy. That was "a clear shift in policy," Kenneth R. Weinstein, director of the Washington office of the Hudson Institute, a conservative supporter of Israel and Likud. The June speech was "a departure point," agreed Ralph Reed, chairman of the Georgia Republican Party and former director of the Christian Coalition.

Since then, U.S. policy has been in step with Sharon's. The peace process is "quiescent," said retired Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni, Bush's special envoy to the region. "I've kind of gone dormant," he added. In December Bush appointed an articulate, hard-line critic of the traditional peace process, Elliott Abrams, director of Mideast affairs for the National Security Council.

"The Likudniks are really in charge now," said a senior government official, using a Yiddish term for supporters of Sharon's political party. Neumann agreed that Abrams's appointment was symbolically important, not least because Abrams's views were shared by his boss, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, by Vice President Cheney and by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. "It's a strong lineup," he said.

Abrams is a former assistant secretary of state in the Reagan administration who was convicted on two counts of lying to Congress in the Iran-contra scandal, then pardoned by President George H.W. Bush. In October 2000, Abrams wrote: "The Palestinian leadership does not want peace with Israel, and there will be no peace."

Said Meyrav Wurmser of the Hudson Institute, who shares his outlook: "Elliott's appointment is a signal that the hard-liners in the administration are playing a more central role in shaping policy." She added that "the hard-liners are a very unique group. The hawks in the administration are in fact people who are the biggest advocates of democracy and freedom in the Middle East." She was referring to the idea that promoting democracy is the best way to assure Israel's security, because democratic countries are less likely to attack a neighbor than dictatorships. Adherents of this view have argued that creating a democratic Palestine and a democratic Iraq could have a positive impact on the entire region.

Some Middle East hands who disagree with these supporters of Israel refer to them as "a cabal," in the words of one former official. Members of the group do not hide their friendships and connections, or their loyalty to strong positions in support of Israel and Likud.

One of Abrams's mentors, Richard Perle, chairman of the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board, led a study group that proposed to Binyamin Netanyahu, a Likud prime minister of Israel from 1996 to 1999, that he abandon the Oslo peace accords negotiated in 1993 and reject the basis for them -- the idea of trading "land for peace.<h3>" Israel should insist on Arab recognition of its claim to the biblical land of Israel, the 1996 report suggested, and should "focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq."</h3>

<b>Besides Perle, the study group included David Wurmser, now a special assistant to Undersecretary of State John R. Bolton, and Douglas J. Feith,</b> now undersecretary of defense for policy. Feith has written prolifically on Israeli-Arab issues for years, arguing that Israel has as legitimate a claim to the West Bank territories seized after the Six Day War as it has to the land that was part of the U.N.-mandated Israel created in 1948. Perle, Feith and Abrams all declined to be interviewed for this article.

Rumsfeld echoed the Perle group's analysis in a little-noted comment to Pentagon employees last August about "the so-called occupied territories." <b>Rumsfeld said: "There was a war [in 1967], Israel urged neighboring countries not to get involved . . . they all jumped in, and they lost a lot of real estate to Israel because Israel prevailed in that conflict. In the intervening period, they've made some settlements in some parts of the so-called occupied area, which was the result of a war, which they won."............</b>

......The State Department pressed for continued negotiations and pressure on Sharon to limit the scope of his military response to Palestinian suicide bombers, while the Pentagon and <b>the vice president's office favored more encouragement for the Israelis, and less concern for a peace process</b> which, they said, was going nowhere anyhow........

But the administration did make a series of statements and gestures intended to restrain Sharon's response to suicide bombings, and to reassert the traditional U.S. policy that Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank had to cease. At the urging of Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, Bush publicly embraced the idea of a Palestinian state.

An internal debate split the administration and invited the lobbying of think tanks, Jewish organizations, evangelical Christians and others who take a fierce interest in the Middle East. While some groups including Americans for Peace Now lined up against Sharon's tough policies and in favor of negotiations, most of the organizations and individuals who lobbied on these issues embraced a harder line, and supported Sharon. Over the past dozen years or more, supporters of Sharon's Likud Party have moved into leadership roles in most of the American Jewish organizations that provide financial and political support for Israel.

Friends of Israel in Congress also lined up with Sharon. <h3>In November 2001, 89 of 100 senators signed a letter to Bush asking the administration not to try to restrain Israel</h3> from using "all [its] strength and might" in response to Palestinian suicide bombings. Signers said they wanted to persuade Bush to prevent Secretary of State Colin L. Powell from pressuring Sharon......

....A series of episodes in which Bush felt Arafat behaved inappropriately further soured the relationship. Bush repeatedly refused to meet with Arafat, who had met with Clinton 21 times. And month after month, U.S. officials blamed Arafat for failing to prevent the suicide bombings in Israel.

After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Sharon began immediately to argue that Israel and the United States were fighting the same enemy, international terrorism. Over the months that followed -- months marked by escalating violence in Israel and the West Bank -- Bush and Sharon grew closer, personally and politically. By the end of last year the two had met seven times and talked on many more occasions by telephone (with Sharon doing nearly all the talking, Israeli officials said). Said a senior official of the first Bush administration who is critical of this one: "Sharon played the president like a violin: 'I'm fighting your war, terrorism is terrorism,' and so on. Sharon did a masterful job."

Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, a leading figure in Jewish-Evangelical Christian relations for two decades, offered a more sympathetic description of Bush's alignment with Israel and Sharon. "President Bush's policy stems from his core as a Christian, his perceptions of right and wrong, good and evil, and of the need to stand up and fight against evil," Eckstein said. "I personally believe it is very personal, not a political maneuver on his part."

Politics have played a role, several sources said. Gary Bauer, an evangelical Christian activist and Republican presidential candidate in 2000, said that he and like-minded evangelicals have campaigned vigorously in support of Israel and Sharon's tough policies. "I think we've had some impact," Bauer said.

Another conservative Republican with Christian ties who has made Israel a cause is House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.). Last April, speaking to a Jewish group in Washington, DeLay called Israel "the lone fountain of liberty" in the Middle East, and endorsed Israeli retention of the occupied territories. He referred to West Bank by the biblical names, Judea and Samaria, which are often used by Israelis who consider them part of Israel.

The Rev. Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention said the White House and its political director, Karl Rove, know "how critical [evangelical] support is to them and their party," and know how strongly evangelicals support Israel. "We need to bless Israel more than America needs Israel's blessing," Land said, "because Israel has a far greater ally than the United States of America, God Almighty."

"This is not your daddy's Republican Party," said James Zogby, president of the Arab-American Institute in Washington, who argues the administration is losing its ability to act as an honest broker in the Middle East by lining up with Israel. "There's a marriage here between the religious right and the neoconservatives," he said, referring to intellectual hard-liners such as Abrams and Perle, both of whom worked for Democrats before joining the Reagan administration.

Bill O'Rights · 07-26-2006, 12:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by host

I decided to shorten "FUNDAMENTALISTS", to "FUNDYS", because of the character count constraints of thread titles.

For real?

I've heard "fundy" used too many times in a psedo-derogatory fashion to completely buy that. Not that I'm judging...I've used it myself on numerous occasions. Just sayin' is all...

Of course...I guess that's better than Christofascist. And "fundy" is so much more fun to say too, isn't it? Fundy fundy fundy fundy. Kind of sounds like "undies" after awhile, huh?

roachboy · 07-26-2006, 03:04 PM

bor: i am not sure that i understand what is going on with your posts here.

1. to say that the cc "is just like any other special interest group" may be true if you assume that all interest groups have always operated as they do now--but that would be false.

ralph reed--as much as i loathe the guy--is pretty slick and has in fact developed from very innovative ways to both mobilize folk and to create the impression of mobilization. the second one is linked to developing switches that enables telephone canvassers who worked on behald of the coalition to patch people directly through to their congressperson's office if they answered correctly on a series of issue-specific questions. the first is more powerful and dangerous--reed was instrumental in trying to erase any meaningful line between evangelical churches and political entities---so that it became ok for a church to use its buses to get parishoners to voting booths--after they have been coached, of course, via voter guides and the words of preachers, about which way god wanted them to act once they were inside the booths.

this is new--politics and religion have not always been collapsed into each other in this way--and the christian coalition is--empirically--a basic force behind the development.

2. i dont know about you, but i think there is kind of a problem with preachers using their power within a church to tell people how god wants them to vote. seems a bit---o what's the word---authoritarian, doesnt it?

and it happens. i have experienced it in my wayward youth, i know preachers who do it, the cc website encourages it...and you do not get this in catholic churches--you might get the priest telling you the church's position--but it is the churches position. god does not tell people how to vote.

seems to me that if devoutly religious folk impute some authority to a preacher because they imagine him or her closer to god, or endowed with more wisdom then they are, then that preacher has alot of power--it also seems to me that telling people that god wants them to vote one way or another is an abuse of that power.

but hey, maybe i just put too much stock in the illusion to separation fo church and state on the one hand, and in the idea that democracy, even in its pathetic american form, involves at some level people gathering information and making decisions on issues based on that information.

3. i get the impression that you think whenever someone uses the term christian fundamentalist that they are really dissing entire regions of the country. i dont understand this--particularly not in this particular thread, where the "bickering" (as you do nicely describe it) has mostly to do with refuting blanket statements that were initially imputed back to host, but which in the end turned out to be examples of poor argument.

so i dont understand.

Bill O'Rights · 07-27-2006, 05:23 AM

Roachboy, roachboy, roachboy....

I think that you are reading too much into it. I don't necessarily disagree with you...I'm just coming into the room from another enterance.

Let's break some of it down. The Christian Coalition has an agenda. Agreed? They need to push that agenda. Right? No matter how you feel about that agenda...they have it, and they need to push it.

Remember...they are an extremely vocal minority. Now...Oh, look at that. They have a huge captive audience of maleable parishoners sitting over here, and over there, and some more over yonder. They'd be fools not to make use of that resource.

Look at it, kind of like Rush Limbaugh and his merry band of "Ditto Heads". Rush may be an idiot...but he's no fool. No sirree. He's a very charasmatic, and effective motivator. He pontificates...and those that refuse to take the time to think things out, go; "Yeah! That's right! You tell 'em Rush!" Not all that much different than the clergy pounding the pulpit.

In so far as the seperation of the church and state? Oh, I believe in it. Yes indeedy I do. However, I'm not so naive as to believe that it exists.
Before my cute little slinky signature, I had "Freedom is that area that lies between the Church and the State". Although I believe that statement, I don't think for one moment that it exists.

Now...what have we got? We've got Christian clergy pounding the pulpit, telling parishioners that the country that they love is going to go straight to hell, led by those Godless Liberals, unless...they vote for this fine upstanding Christian boy that's running for office. Is that right? Hell no! Do they have the right? Hell, yes!

Although...and this is just more pie in the sky...I'd remove their tax exempt status. If the Church wants to be active in politics...let 'em and tax 'em. Can you here the cries of anguish? "But, but...were a church! We don't pay taxes. It's just unheard of". Hit 'em where it counts, roachboy. Right smack in the middle of their pocketbooks. Talk about a wailing and a gnashing of teeth.

Ustwo · 07-27-2006, 05:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aladdin Sane

The way this issue was framed makes it more appropriate for Tilted Paranoia. Some people see the devil behind every political liberal, while others dress him up as a Christian fundamentalist who wants to destroy the environment.

Welcome to TFP politics board of late.

Seaver · 07-27-2006, 08:00 AM

Quote:

Although...and this is just more pie in the sky...I'd remove their tax exempt status. If the Church wants to be active in politics...let 'em and tax 'em. Can you here the cries of anguish? "But, but...were a church! We don't pay taxes. It's just unheard of". Hit 'em where it counts, roachboy. Right smack in the middle of their pocketbooks. Talk about a wailing and a gnashing of teeth.

So basically no group should be tax exempt? NAACP are just as active in motivating their politics... they shouldn't be exempt? How about Amnesty International? How about PETA? How about any of the other thousands of NGOs?

Of course they're political. They have their view on what is right and encourage people of similar belief to vote for people who support that view. Is that any different than any other NGO?

roachboy · 07-27-2006, 12:15 PM

because, seaver, churches pay not taxes because they a religious organizations.
the criteria for tax exempt status is clear about the distinction.
read it, if you like.

Quote:

Religious Organization Workbook*
>Tax Status
>A. Federal

Intro

Just because an organization is incorporated under either the Religious Corporation Act or the General Not For Profit Act does not mean that it is automatically exempt from federal income taxes. It may or may not qualify for exemption from federal income tax. If it does qualify, a determination should be made as to whether it would be advantageous to seek exemption. Most religious organizations seek a confirmation from the Internal Revenue Service that they are tax exempt for two reasons. First, it exempts the organization from paying federal income taxes. Second, it enables donors to claim a federal income tax deduction for contributions made. Without this benefit, many religious organizations would find it difficult to operate. For further information, see IRS publication 557, Tax Exempt Status for Your Organization. <http://ftp.fedworld.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p557.pdf>
1. Initial Filings Required with the IRS

Religious organizations seeking recognition of exemption from federal income tax must use a form specifically prescribed by the IRS, Form 1023 - Application for Recognition of Exemption Under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. <http://ftp.fedworld.gov/pub/irs-pdf/k1023.pdf>

Religious organizations that are part of a larger religious organization should see whether the organization has a group exemption from the IRS.
2. Tax Reporting Requirements

Exempt organizations, other than private foundations, must file an annual return with the IRS on either a Form 990 or a Form 990-EZ. However, the following types of religious organizations are exempt from this filing requirement:

· A church, an interchurch organization of local units of a church, a convention or association of churches, or an integrated auxiliary of a church.

· A church-affiliated organization that is exclusively engaged in managing funds or maintaining retirement programs.

· A school below college level affiliated with a church or operated by a religious order, even though it is not an integrated auxiliary of a church.

· A mission society sponsored by or affiliated with one or more churches or church denominations, more than one-half of the activities of which society are conducted in, or directed at persons in, foreign countries.

· An exclusively religious activity of any religious order.

· A religious or apostolic organization described in section 501(d) of the Internal Revenue Code. (Required to file Form 1065, U.S. Partnership Return of Income.)

· An exempt organization (other than a private foundation, discussed in chapter 3) having gross receipts in each tax year that normally are not more than $25,000. (See the instructions for Form 990 for more information about what constitutes annual gross receipts that are normally not more than $25,000.)
3. Special Issues

Organizations that are exempt from federal income taxation under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code are commonly referred to as "501(c)(3) organizations." Such organizations are prohibited from participating or intervening in political campaigns on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for national, state or local political office. If a 501(c)(3) organization engages in prohibited political campaign activity, the IRS may assess substantial fines against the organization and challenge its tax exempt status, thereby threatening the organization's ability to receive tax-deductible contributions.

It is important to know what activity is prohibited political campaigning and what is not. Consequently, we have summarized some of the IRS rules to help you distinguish prohibited political campaigning from permitted political activity.

Prohibited political activity is any political campaigning undertaken by or in the name of a 501(c)(3) organization. Prohibited political campaigning includes:

· Directly or indirectly supporting or opposing any candidate for elective public office. Examples include making statements supporting or opposing a candidate in a sermon or church bulletin, editorializing in a religious periodical, or distributing campaign literature or biased voter education material;

· Providing financial support to any candidate, which would include, making direct monetary contributions to a candidate, providing free or selective use of the organization's volunteers or paid staff to the candidate, allowing a candidate to use the organization's facilities or office equipment, or providing candidates with the organization's mailing lists on a preferential basis without charge;

· Distributing campaign literature or biased voter education material on the organization's premises, through its mailings, during worship services, or by other means, such as using stationary identifying the organization to send out letters supporting or opposing particular candidates. Examples of this kind of prohibited political activity would include:

· the distribution by volunteers of the 501(c)(3) organization or by representatives of a candidate or a political party of flyers for candidates during an organization's rummage sale;

· the distribution by a candidate at an organization's event of campaign buttons or other items; or

· the distribution by local community group affiliated with the organization political literature supporting or opposing a candidate on stationary that identifies the group's affiliation with the 501(c)(3) organization.

· Publishing paid political advertising, biased coverage of candidate activity or opinions that endorse or oppose a particular candidate in the organization's bulletin or other publication; or

· Endorsing a candidate at an official function of the organization or in an official publication of the organization.

501(c)(3) organizations may engage in the following political activity since the IRS does not view such activity as political campaigning:

· Sponsoring voter registration drives and encourage citizens to vote, provided that no candidate or political party is supported or opposed at the drive;

· Attempting to educate voters about issues or candidates' positions on the issues through the publication and/or distribution of unbiased, nonpartisan voter guides. To be considered unbiased, voter guides must cover a wide range of issues that are selected on the basis of their importance to the electorate and must report the issues in an accurate manner with no editorial comment. Unbiased voter guides are generally based on the results of candidate polls or questionnaires to candidates that were not designed to make candidates appear acceptable or unacceptable to the 501(c)(3) organization. Biased voter guides, which are considered campaigning, are guides that would include statements or material that would make evident that the candidate agrees or disagrees with the organization's position or that the organization agrees or disagrees with the candidate's position.

· Sponsoring nonpartisan public forums, debates, or lectures, provided that all qualified candidates are invited, that the questions and topics addressed at the event cover a broad range of issues, that each candidate has an equal opportunity to present his/her view, and that the moderator does not show approval or disapproval of any particular candidate's response or presentation;

b) Unrelated Business Activities and Taxes

Under the Internal Revenue Code, organizations that are exempt from income tax under Section 501(c)(3) of the Code are subject to tax on the unrelated business taxable income they earn each year. The primary purpose of the unrelated business income tax laws are to eliminate a source of unfair competition by placing the unrelated business activities of exempt organizations upon the same tax basis as the commercial business endeavors with which they compete.

The term "unrelated business taxable income" is the income generated by an exempt organization "from any unrelated trade or business" which it regularly carries on. A trade or business is "unrelated" to an exempt organization if it is not substantially related to the organization's exempt purpose. A trade or business is "substantially related" to an organization's exempt purpose if it contributes importantly to the accomplishment of the organization's exempt purpose. Whether or not a trade or business is substantially related to an organization's exempt purposes depends upon the facts of each particular case. The term unrelated trade or business does not include any trade or business which is carried on primarily for the convenience of the exempt organization's members, students, patients, officers or employees and also does not include a trade or business where substantially all of the work to carry out the trade or business is performed by persons who do not receive any form of compensation for their services.

Certain types of income, which would otherwise satisfy the definition of unrelated business taxable income, are nonetheless excluded from taxation. Among the types of income generally excluded from taxation as unrelated business taxable income are income earned from the rental of real property, royalty income, interest and dividends.

Among the types of activities that may generate unrelated business taxable income for an exempt organization include income earned from the operation of a bookstore, a cafeteria, or a publishing company. If the services being provided by the exempt organization can be or are also provided by a non-exempt organization, it is more likely that the IRS will consider the income to be taxable. To prevent taxation, an organization must be able to demonstrate that the activity which generates the income contributes importantly to the mission of the organization and that the organization does not derive an unfair competitive advantage over commercial enterprises by being able to treat the income from the activity as nontaxable.

Religious organizations exempt from taxation as 501(c)(3) organizations should consult with an accountant and/or an attorney if it appears that they engage in activities that could generate taxable income.

c) Intermediate Sanctions

Section 4958 of the Internal Revenue Code imposes a two-tier excise tax on "disqualified persons" engaging in "excess benefit transactions" with section 501(c)(3) organizations. These so-called "intermediate sanctions" apply to churches as well as other tax-exempt organizations. However, a special rule applies - the procedures of the "Church Audit Procedures Act" will be used "in initiating and conducting any inquiry or examination into whether an excess benefit transaction has occurred between a church and a disqualified person. The Church Audit Procedures Act imposes detailed limitations on IRS examinations of churches:

The first-tier tax is 25 percent of the amount of "excess benefit." The second-tier tax, which is imposed if the excess benefit transaction is not corrected through repayment, is 200 percent of the amount of excess benefit. These taxes are imposed on the disqualified person, not the exempt organization. Thus, if compensation or other transactions with disqualified persons are determined to be excessive, the result for the disqualified person is either repayment of the excessive amount and payment of a tax of 25 percent of that amount or payment of taxes of 25 percent and 200 percent of the excess amount. This tax is imposed whether or not the disqualified person's participation was knowing or willful.

Trustees, directors, and officers can have personal exposure for excess benefit transactions. If the excise tax is imposed on a disqualified person, "organization managers" of the tax-exempt organization, as defined below, are also subject to an excise tax if they knowingly participate in an excess benefit transaction. This tax does not apply if their participation is not willful and is due to reasonable cause. The tax is ten percent of the excess benefit amount, up to an aggregate maximum of $10,000 per transaction.

If an excise tax is imposed on disqualified persons or organization managers, a penalty equal to the amount of the tax may also be imposed for repeated or willful and flagrant violations.

The excise tax may be imposed instead of revocation of tax exemption or, in extreme cases, intermediate sanctions may be imposed along with revocation of exemption.

Seaver · 07-27-2006, 05:19 PM

Ok so that's why churches do not actively support candidates.

What about religious NGOs that are actually doing the political activities?

host · 11-03-2006, 10:42 AM

Buh...bye....Ted Haggard....

Quote:

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedi...news-a_section

Evangelical leader steps down amid allegations
The Rev. Ted Haggard denies a man's public charges that the pastor of a mega-church had been paying him for sex.
By Stephanie Simon, Times Staff Writer
November 3, 2006

DENVER — The president of the National Assn. of Evangelicals resigned Thursday after his Colorado Springs, Colo., mega-church opened an investigation into allegations that he had repeatedly paid for sex with a male prostitute.

The Rev. Ted Haggard, who regularly consults with the White House on policy matters, told a Denver television station that he "never had a gay relationship with anybody" and had been faithful to his wife of 28 years.

In a statement released by New Life Church, where he is senior pastor, the 50-year-old Haggard added: "I hope to be able to discuss this matter in more detail at a later date. In the interim, I will seek both spiritual advice and guidance."

The allegations were made Wednesday on a Denver talk radio station, KHOW-AM. Mike Jones, who described himself as a male escort, said he had a sexual "business relationship" with Haggard for the last three years. Jones, 49, told the Associated Press that he had saved voicemail messages from Haggard, as well as an envelope that he said Haggard had used to mail him cash.

A committee of pastors from across the country has been convened to investigate the allegations. They can "discipline me if I need to be disciplined, fire me if I need to be fired," Haggard told KUSA-TV. He also placed himself on administrative leave from the 14,000-member church pending the investigation, saying he could not continue to minister "under the cloud created by the accusations."

A father of five who dresses in blue jeans and drives a Chevy pickup, Haggard is well-known, and widely praised, as an energetic, charismatic pastor who has pushed to expand evangelical activism into issues such as global warming and world poverty. But he hasn't shied away from the traditional culture-war issues of abortion and homosexuality.

A lengthy profile in Harper's magazine — which is quoted approvingly on Haggard's website — <h3>recounts how he built New Life Church in part by hanging out at gay bars and inviting the patrons to come to his sermons and be saved.</h3>

Under Haggard's leadership, the National Assn. of Evangelicals, which has 30 million members, reaffirmed a policy statement that describes homosexuality as "a deviation from the Creator's plan" and calls same-sex relations a sin that, "if persisted in … excludes one from the Kingdom of God."

Haggard has lobbied for a U.S. constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage; he also supports the gay-marriage ban that will go before Colorado voters Tuesday......

<b>The following is an article from post #20, on this thread, and....if you're interested, I posted other articles, on this thread, that report on the christian "influence" at the Air Force Academy....</b>

Quote:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9830808/
A religious revolution in America
'Tom Brokaw Reports: In God They Trust' explores why so many Americans are turning to this expression of faith FREE VIDEO

• ‘In God They Trust’
In the upcoming “Tom Brokaw Reports: In God They Trust,” to be broadcast on Friday, Oct. 28 8 p.m., Brokaw explores why so many Americans are turning to this expression of faith, and asks whether or not some Evangelicals are going too far. Watch a preview.

By Tom Brokaw
NBC News
Updated: 10:26 a.m. ET Oct 28, 2005

For some time now I've been intrigued by the growing presence and power of the evangelical Christian movement in American politics, particularly in presidential election years. <h3>I concluded there was an acute shortage of reporting on WHY so many Americans were getting involved in the evangelical church and how they were treated by the political establishment.
</h3>
We chose the New Life church in Colorado Springs, Colorado, as the primary site for our report <b>because its pastor, Ted Haggard, is president of the National Association of Evangelicals, and because it is emblematic of the expanding place of so called mega-churches in America. </b>

Also, New Life is close to the U.S. Air Force Academy which has been embroiled in controversy over the place of evangelical Christianity in the ranks and faculty at the academy........

xxSquirtxx · 11-03-2006, 11:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aladdin Sane

The way this issue was framed makes it more appropriate for Tilted Paranoia. Some people see the devil behind every political liberal, while others dress him up as a Christian fundamentalist who wants to destroy the environment.

Aladdin Sane for the win.

Personally, until America is governed by Sharia law, I'm not going to wring my hands, slobber on myself, or don a tinfoil hat over people with religious convictions voting for people who will uphold the morals they hold true.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bill O'Rights

If the Church wants to be active in politics...let 'em and tax 'em.

Especially the churches where Al Gore likes to preach in.

host · 11-03-2006, 11:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by xxSquirtxx

......or don a tinfoil hat over people with religious convictions voting for people who will uphold the morals they hold true.

xxSquirtxx....give it up! This was their "head man"....president of their national evangelical association....the standard bearer...identified for coverage by Tom Brokaw, a year ago....

Quote:

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drm...115903,00.html
Minister admits massage from accuser
By Rocky Mountain News
November 3, 2006
Embattled minister Ted Haggard this morning admitted receiving a massage from the Denver man who claims to have exchanged sex for money with the Colorado Springs church leader for three years.

Haggard was driving out of his home with his wife Gayle and three of his five children when he gave a brief interview to a gathering of reporters.

Haggard stepped down Thursday as president of the National Association of Evangelicals and as pastor of the 14,000-member New Life Church of Colorado Springs after Michael Jones, 49, said he had been having paid sex with Haggard once a month for three years and helped provided him with methamphetamine.

This morning, Haggard said he had never had sex with Jones but said he did buy methamphetamine out of curiosity.

Haggard said he never consumed it but threw it away.

Haggard said he was referred to Jones for a massage by a hotel in Denver. The minister said he travels to Denver to write books.

<b>Haggard drew a silent stare from his wife when he told the gathered reporters that he received a massage from Jones.</b>

Jones, who describes himself as a former prostitute failed a polygraph test administered Friday morning in Denver, when questioned about sex with Haggard

The polygrapher, John Kresnik, said the results "indicated deception" but he also believed the results may have been skewed because Jones, was suffering from a migraine and didn’t get much sleep. ......

evangelical christians chose this guy...their pastors voted for him to lead their national organization. They also....more than 90 percent of them....voted for Bush and for every congressional republican that is under investigation or already been sentenced to prison time.

Where is the evidence of the accuracy of the "discernment" that they all talk about. They "pray about" everything....every decision. They keep getting it wrong, but they do not budge....or change....ever.

Haggard contaminated the US Air Force Academy with his phony christian proselytizing.....and, xxSquirtxx, aren't you finding....more and more that your time is spent defending and dismissing the scandals and controversies that your extreme POV is immersed in and associated with? But....you do not budge or change anything in your point of view. If I was always wrong about who I admired, voted for, defended, was influenced by....I would re-examine my positions and my associations....

xxSquirtxx · 11-03-2006, 11:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by host

aren't you finding....more and more that your time is spent defending and dismissing the scandals and controversies that your extreme POV is immersed in and associated with?

Nope. I'm finding more and more I'm having to point out the BS machine around here.

Quote:

Originally Posted by host

But....you do not budge or change anything in your point of view. If I was always wrong about who I admired, voted for, defended, was influenced by....I would re-examine my positions and my associations....

Frankly, you don't know what my point of view is, and you certainly do not know if I've changed my mind about anything. Even more importantly, you don't know who the hell I admire or don't admire, voted for, or am influenced by. Keep your lame assumptions to yourself.

host · 01-18-2008, 12:06 AM

I've come back here tonight to post on this thread because it is my hope that, for the voters and politically influential among the 65 million, mostly American buyers of CNP founder, Tim LaHaye's "Left Behind" literary series of rapture scenarios, the presidential candidacy of Mike Huckabee will turn out to be the high water mark of their influence on AMerican politics and on AMerican foreign, domestic, and judicial appointment policies.

IMO, this is the most lacking group of republican presidential candidates to emerge in my lifetime, and maybe longer. I know that most non-christian evangelical, republican supporters must also look at Huckabee's emergence as a viable candidate with alarm, though they be loathe to ever admit here that it is of any concern.

This disconnection and incoherence....so many American focused on bringing about conditions in Israel so that they mesh with biblical interpretation as fed to them by these politicized evangelical leaders, is the alpha to the omega of the islamo-fascist biblical opponent that they have conjured up to mesh with their pop religious "rapture ready" delerium.

Huckabee is their standard bearer, and due to the pathetic nature of the rest of the field of candidates, here he comes. The prideful pompousness of the non-rapture believing republican supporters would leave them silent on the sidelines, watching the absurdity of all of this, with the rest of us, except for the fact that they also subscribe to the waging of war against the islamo-fascist "other" which they so sincerely and cooperatively helped the rapturist assemble, hype, and demonize.

Absolutely amazing to watch, research and write about, if it wasn't really happening, consequences and all, in real time:

Quote:

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/20...e_connections/
Jan. 18, 2008 | Mike Huckabee, the former Baptist preacher turned Arkansas governor and now Republican presidential candidate, has deep connections to some conservative Christians with radical political ideas. As Salon's Mike Madden details <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/01/18/huckabee2/">here</a>, while Huckabee talks up his experience visiting Israel in response to questions about foreign policy, <h3>he is also campaigning with the support of prominent figures who see Israel as the site of a coming Armageddon.</h3> Huckabee's connections within the evangelical movement also extend to leaders whose focus is on the United States; a number of those leaders are working to transform the United States into a Christian nation governed by what they see as biblical principles. On Monday, as Salon columnist Joe Conason <a href="http://www.salon.com/opinion/conason/2008/01/18/huckabee/">notes</a>, Huckabee seemed to hint that he shares at least some of that vision. "It's a lot easier to change the Constitution," said Huckabee, "than it would be to change the word of the living God, and that's what we need to do, is to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards."

Ideas like the ones some of Huckabee's supporters hold stem from two radical doctrines, reconstructionism and dominionism. As Conason writes, these ideas come down to "the notion that America, indeed every nation on earth, is meant to be governed by biblical law." Additionally, they stem from a belief that the United States was founded as a Christian nation, then betrayed by secular humanist liberals who created a myth of separation of church and state in the 20th century, leading the country to immorality and godlessness, and that the United States must be taken back by Christians. Some of the proponents of this idea are unashamed about using the word "theocracy" to describe their goal. The most radical among them -- including two of the movement's leading lights and progenitors, R.J. Rushdoony and his son-in-law Gary North -- advocate a return to the practice of stoning as a method of execution, and expanding this death sentence to the crimes of homosexuality, blasphemy and cursing one's parents....

With the exception of Huckabee's clearly non US best interersts policy positions on Israel, this article indicates that almost all of the rest of Huckabee's views on relations with the rest of the world are....unknown.

Quote:

http://www.cfr.org/bios/13301/

...Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Huckabee, who has taken nine trips to Israel in past 35 years, calls himself a “steadfast supporter” of Israel. On his campaign site, Huckabee pledges that as president, he would “ensure that Israel has access to the state-of-the-art weapons and technology she needs to defend herself from those who seek her annihilation.”

In October 2007, Huckabee said he believes a Palestinian state should be created (Yeshiva World), but that it should be moved away from Israel. He named Egypt and Saudi Arabia as possible locations.....

Quote:

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2...-for-huckabee/
November 19, 2007, 11:01 pm
Evangelical Help for Huckabee
By David D. Kirkpatrick

Mike Huckabee, the Republican presidential candidate and former Southern Baptist minister, is getting help from Tim LaHaye, the Christian conservative organizer and co-author of the apocalyptic “Left Behind” novels.
“America and our Judeo-Christian heritage are under attack by a force that is more destructive than any America has faced” since Hitler,Dr. LaHaye and his wife, Beverly, wrote in letters sent to lists of conservative Christians in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. “Defeating the radical jihadists will require renewed resolve and spiritual rearmament by the evangelical pastors in America.”
The letters were distributed in part through an e-mail list maintained by Mrs. LaHaye’s organization, Concerned Women for America, to encourage pastors to attend two-day conferences held in each state (free, including meals and a hotel room). Mr. Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor, is the only candidate speaking.
All events are held by nonprofit charities. The Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said the inclusion of only one candidate raised “red flags” about an impermissible political endorsement. But David Lane, the events’ principal organizer, said he had invited all the candidates.
A campaign spokesman said Mr. Huckabee had read some of the “Left Behind” novels and enjoyed them.

Quote:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/max-bl...y_b_81467.html
Is Huckabee Rapture Ready? And Why Did He Free A Born-Again Rapist? A Confidant Speaks
Posted January 14, 2008 | 05:19 PM (EST)

....Cole was no more kind to Muslims. "If you think communism's bad, just think what the Islamics are doing," Cole warned. "Those people have no -- they're just not human. They're just not human."

On the campaign trail, Huckabee has ventured some opinions that dovetail at least loosely with Cole's. Discussing Romney's Mormon faith with a reporter while stumping through Iowa, Huckabee asked darkly, "Don't Mormons believe that Jesus is Satan's brother?"

Huckabee routinely warns of the threat of "Islamofascism" at campaign rallies and is perhaps the first major presidential candidate in American history to essentially call for the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Huckabee <a href="http://www.jrtelegraph.com/2007/10/gov-mike-huckab.html">declared</a> during a New Hampshire fundraiser in October that a Palestinian state should only be established outside of biblical Israel, possibly in Egypt or Saudi Arabia, according to the Jewish Russian Telegraph. He reiterated this position during an appearance on Face the Nation in November.....

....Israel and the Apocalypse

Huckabee's advocacy of forcibly transferring the Palestinians to other Arab nations reflects his close association with some of America's most prominent End Times theological proponents. Among Huckabee's leading evangelical backers is Pastor John Hagee, head of a Pentecostal congregation in San Antonio, Texas, with 18,000 members, and the executive director of Christians United for Israel, a national lobbying group that organizes against a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine crisis and in favor of a military strike on Iran.

Hagee's zealous support for Israel is kindled by his belief that Jesus will one day return to "biblical Israel" to usher in a kingdom of Heaven on Earth. "As soon as Jesus sits on his throne he's gonna rule the world with a rod of iron," Hagee told his congregation in a sermon this December. "That means he's gonna make the ACLU do what he wants them to. That means you're not gonna have to ask if you can pray in public school... We will live by the law of God and no other law."

Huckabee made a pilgrimage to Hagee's Cornerstone Church just one week after the pastor's anti-ACLU jeremiad. During the first of two sermons Huckabee delivered there, he was greeted with a thunderous standing ovation. The candidate returned the sentiment, hailing his gracious host, Hagee, as "one of the great Christian leaders of our nation."

Huckabee has also welcomed the endorsement of Tim LaHaye, the co-author of the bestselling Left Behind pulp fiction series, which tells of the coming apocalyptic battle between followers of Jesus and forces of Satan. Paige Patterson, president of the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, where Huckabee once studied (he dropped out to work for a televangelist), is an outspoken believer in End Times theology as well. Patterson is one of the chief organizers of the right-wing takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Just as his surge in the polls began, Huckabee addressed the student body of the late Rev. Jerry Falwell's Liberty University in November. There, he assured his enraptured audience that his sudden rise had nothing to do with his "easy-going" style. "There's only one explanation for [my surge] and it's not a human one," Huckabee insisted, inspiring gales of applause from the overflow crowd. "It's the same power that helped a little boy with two fish and five loaves feed a crowd of five thousand people."

Huckabee made his remarkable statement in response to a question from a student -- not a reporter. Political reporters with access to the candidate have so far shied away from asking him pointed questions about his theological beliefs. They have been especially reluctant to ask Huckabee how he thinks the world will end or how his Messiah will return. Consequently, the image of Huckabee as a transcendent, post-partisan politician has prevailed. He remains the affable, bass-playing Republican counterpart to Barack Obama, not the sectarian ideologue who sought the counsel of fringe characters like Cole.

Huckabee has burnished his likable sheen by replacing the ornery clergymen who propelled his early ascendancy in Arkansas politics with a cast of telegenic evangelical celebrities. His new boosters include Chuck Norris, a B-level action movie star who has converted to evangelical Christianity and become a fixture at Huckabee's side on the campaign trail.

Cole, for his part, told me he has not spoken to his old friend "Mike" in six months. "He's so busy it's an impossibility to get to him," Cole said. "I've been meaning to call him." Now 78 years old and afflicted with terminal heart disease, Cole has been left behind.

Yet back when Huckabee launched his preaching career in 1980, he went straight to Cole for assistance. "He's actually known me longer than I've known him," Cole said of Huckabee. Cole, who had operated a missionary supply organization that established Christian television and radio stations in the Third World, said he helped the young Huckabee when he started his own television show in Arkansas. Huckabee's show, Positive Alternatives, which first aired in the cities Pine Bluff and Texarkana in 1980, became his vehicle for statewide recognition. By 1989, with Cole's support, Huckabee had become the youngest-ever president of the 500,000-member Arkansas Baptist State Convention.....

Quote:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...704662,00.html
Jesus Christ's Superstar
Thursday, Jan. 17, 2008 By JAMES PONIEWOZIK

<img src="http://img.timeinc.net/time/daily/2008/0801/a_atunedin_0128.jpg">

....Many voters first met Huckabee through the campaign spot in which he traded lines with action star Norris. The ad did more than defuse the humorless-preacher stereotype; it also spoke to Huckabee's base. To a general audience, Norris is a camp figure. But, notes Daniel Radosh, author of the forthcoming book Rapture Ready!, about Christian pop culture, Evangelicals know Norris as the author of a popular spiritual memoir and co-author of two Christian western novels. To the public, appearing with Norris says Huckabee doesn't take himself too seriously. But, Radosh adds, "within the Christian culture bubble, it's a way of saying, 'I'm one of you.'"

Ironically, Huckabee may benefit from media stereotypes. To people who think of evangelical leaders as Bible thumpers, a pastor playing Devil with a Blue Dress On on bass is like a dog walking on its hind legs—though rock bands are common in modern churches. <h3>"In New York and L.A., there's this complete ignorance about what Evangelicals are really like,"</h3> says Alexandra Pelosi, a documentarian (and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's daughter) who made the HBO movie Friends of God, about evangelical culture. "When I visited megachurches, the pastors were all making Napoleon Dynamite references."

A cultural divide shows, too, between Huckabee's base voters and the evangelical leaders who endorsed other GOP candidates. Adam Smith, editorial director of Relevant, a magazine for young Christians, says Huckabee's engagement with the pop world speaks to younger Evangelicals. "Most of our readers don't really see a demarcation between mainstream culture and 'church culture,'" he says.

Huckabee's greatest pop-culture weapon, though, may be the late-night shows. His humor is easy, wry and self-deprecating, but it's also strategic. Some Huckabee positions—on abortion, the so-called FairTax, immigration, aligning the Constitution with "God's standards"—would alienate some voters. But his joking reinforces his cultivated image as the conservative who's "not mad at anybody." And his dry irony—the lingua franca of pop culture—allows him to sandwich actual answers on awkward issues with his jokes. If he's lucky, viewers won't notice, or mind, the difference.

On a recent Colbert Report, Huckabee riffed to Stephen Colbert on Senator John McCain's vow to pursue Osama bin Laden "to the gates of hell." "I will charge hell with a water pistol if necessary," Huckabee deadpanned, as if to one-up McCain. How about outsourcing jobs? "As long as it isn't mine." Then Colbert asked if he believed that evolution was a farce. "It's all a farce," Huckabee said, in his usual dry tone. Ha ha! How droll! Except ... um ... he doesn't believe in evolution.

Having a foot in both worlds likewise allows Huckabee to play both media darling and media outsider. When he ran into controversy over a Christmas TV ad, he could blame it on a secular-culture "war against Christmas." When he pulled a negative TV ad yet showed it at a press conference, he explained the apparent hypocrisy by saying the skeptical press gave him no choice but to show it to them. Yet he's also a more ubiquitous presence on newscasts than the HeadOn commercials. He's running against, and on the backs of, the media.

Any crossover effort can have limits. Entertainer-preacher Huckabee could simply end up being the best-liked candidate among people who will never vote for him. But he has already become the political embodiment of the megachurch approach: <h3>get people in the door with rock or cappuccino or stand-up—but get them in the door. "Religion and politics and show business are all about attracting people,"</h3> Pelosi says. The big question is whether Huckabee can keep his lyrics from drowning out his music.

Kpax · 01-18-2008, 01:04 AM

I voted "coincidence." Religion may be a variable in politics as far as members are concerned, but the only real motivator of actions, in the end, is the good ol' greenback.

View Poll Results: Does voting potential of rapture believers drive U.S. environmental & foreign policy?
Not at all.	8	22.86%
It is just a coincidence.	3	8.57%
Yes, but not to the extent outlined in the OP	11	31.43%
Christian fundamentalists have gained control of U.S. policy.	17	48.57%
Multiple Choice Poll. Voters: 35. You may not vote on this poll

07-25-2006, 11:00 AM	#3 (permalink)
Bill O'Rights will always be an Alyson Hanniganite Location: In the dust of the archives	Biased much? Hell, I'm an athiest and I furl a brow over "Rapture Believers" and "Fundys". I do, of course use those terms, but not when trying to conduct a poll. "Gee...which way does he expect it to go"? "Excuse me Ma'am...which do you prefer? The taste of this delightfully refreshing carbonated softdrink...or the putrid, fetid, vile taste of this carbonated sewage waste?" __________________ "I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony "Hedonism with rules isn't hedonism at all, it's the Republican party." - JumpinJesus It is indisputable that true beauty lies within...but a nice rack sure doesn't hurt.

07-25-2006, 12:26 PM	#5 (permalink)
Seaver Junkie Location: Fort Worth, TX	Um.. so a person who leads the country according to his own morals means the loony fringe is leading the country? I'm sorry, but you seriously need to research some of the groups you put out there. I've been to the Officer's Christian Fellowship, as well as their brother group Fellowship of Christian Athletes. None of them teach the Rapture, none of them teach how abortion is wrong, they don't do anything harmful to anyone. You know what they DO do? they support family members of those wounded or killed in battle. They support families of members who's parents fall ill, are unemployed, etc. And on their meetings they simply have a good time, talk a little about religion, and organize fundraisers for the community. OH THE SKY IS FALLING! Sorry Host, but you must come to realize that close to 90% of the US is religious. And those religious people more often than not follow their beliefs on what is wrong and right. And those beliefs are more often than not carried into the ballot box. I'm sorry I dont buy your argument that global warming, an unstable Middle East, etc., are all because a bunch of radicals are trying to bring about the apocalypse. Last edited by Seaver; 07-25-2006 at 12:28 PM..

07-25-2006, 12:52 PM	#6 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	seaver: your posts no. 5 really does not make sense: either (1) christianity encompasses a wide range of beliefs, most of which have little contact with those of protestant fundamentalist groups that politically situate themselves on the extreme right or (2) all christians endorse the set of assumptions particular to fundamentalist protestant groups that politically situate themselves on the extreme right. you post seems to argue that both are true at once. both cant be. whch is it, then? __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

07-25-2006, 01:18 PM	#8 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	seaver--thanks---i took your earlier post as implying that to be a christian meant agreeing with fundamentalist protestant positions--which is simply wrong. you can start almost anywhere and find that fundamentalist protestants are quite strange within christianity--from the assumption that the bible is literally true, through the "end times" nonsense, through the relation between religious and political beliefs. i think it is naive to assume that christianity has any monopoly on people's ethics--i think deeply religious people might prefer to think that is true--but it really isnt. you might think about the enormous phenomenon that is the catholic church in america, its problematic relations with rome, the huge diversity of political positions elaborated in/through catholicism directly and indirectly--you cant really say much of anything about catholics being of one mind politically about anything--nor can you say that the ways catholics map their religious beliefs onto politics is necessarily direct. i emphasize extreme right politics when i refer to fundamentalist protestant groups because--well---it's true. i dont use it to refer to all of christianity because that would be stupid. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

07-25-2006, 09:21 AM	#2 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	Looking at the big picture, I think it is obvious that current decision making at the top levels of the US government are based, at least in part, on religous dogmatic teachings that have no place in the political process. Decision making based on religous clairvoiance, or knowledge of the religous future, is not only damning to the country, but is evidence of psychosis. Wasn't it Martin Luther, father of modern Protestantism, who said that if he knew God was coming tomorrow, I'd plant a tree today?

07-25-2006, 02:30 PM	#11 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	seaver: if that's true, then it would follow that one can oppose the influence of a particular sector of christianity over public life and not be saying anything about the general relaton of religion--or even of christianity as a whole--to politics. nor would the argument speak to any general question of morality/ethics and their relations to politics. the op was not "how horrible it is that christians have any role on government" but rather posed questions about the (apparent) public acceptance of positions drawn from a very narrow range of christian beliefs--one that happens to work as part of the populist coalition that is the conservative mass base--that is fundamentalist or evangelical protestant churches. no time at the moment for more. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

07-25-2006, 07:20 PM	#12 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	I belive (religously) that the population of the earth should be reduced by roughly 1000 times. If I were to become president, and I formulate all my decisions starting with the question, "How will this reduce the population of the eart?", how good of a president would I be? Pretty crappy? Religion is good beans so long as one uses it responsibly. Opening the good book every time a decision needs to be made isn't just irresponsible, it's a theocracy. We don't live in a theocracy (or at elast we aren't supposed to). The idea is that the state is run by those that have the best interest of all people in mind, and that one of the best interests of the people is to have free religion. While Christianity (all religions, really) come with a set of nifty morals, the broader consideration should always be made. Imagine that you are a Muslim in a country rules by Christians who only rule in favor of Christianity. Imagine that you are a Christian in a country rulsed by Muslims that base all decisions on Islam. The fact that religion is so varied alone should make it obvious that decision making on a federal scale is absurd. WWJD should not be a t-shirt the President should wear, or a philosophy he should follow (though it'd be better than what he's doing now...I doubt Jesus would have invaded Iraq). What wouldn't Jesus do?

07-25-2006, 08:10 PM	#13 (permalink)
powerclown Junkie Location: Detroit, MI	According to you, Israel, JINSA and the Jews run American foreign policy. Now you're saying the fundamentalist Christians run American foreign policy. Not a big religion guy, are you host?

07-26-2006, 07:08 AM	#16 (permalink)
powerclown Junkie Location: Detroit, MI	In America, you have a majority of people who are white and Christian. You are inevitably going to get political involvement and influence from these people. What I question, though, is the immediate leap to radicalizing these people's influence and motives. Isn't there such thing as moderate, responsible, reasonable Christians? Why are all religious people (who run the entire spectrum of orthodoxy and observance) automatically branded as Taliban-like, fire-breathing radicals? Is it the phenomenon of internet communication? Is it the high-profile idiocy of certain irresponsible, egomanical televangelists? Sorry I don't see the merit of recklessly and arbitrarily bouncing around in an attempt to study the situation - from religion to religion - from event to event - from issue to issue. Also, I believe that framing complex issues in highly emotional and incendiary language only clouds the issue, promotes divisiveness, closes people's minds, and pushes them further away from the truth - or at least a civil conversation. ---- PHILADELPHIA: The Surprising Spectrum of Evangelicals By Paul Nussbaum Staff Writer THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER PHILADELPHIA (June 19, 2005)--The only bumper sticker on the Rev. Ted Haggard's red pickup truck proclaims: Vote for Pedro. Haggard, founder and senior minister of the 11,000-member New Life Church in Colorado Springs, is president of the National Association of Evangelicals. Pedro is Pedro Sanchez, the inscrutable candidate for class president in the screwball comedy movie Napoleon Dynamite. This is not the politics usually associated with evangelical Christians. Frequently portrayed as uniformly reactionary or fundamentalist, evangelicals - drawing increased attention because of their pivotal role in the 2004 election - are actually an amalgam of unpredictable, sometimes contradictory, strains of Christianity across a broad spectrum of the nation. And many evangelicals are interested in far more than the hot-button issues of abortion and homosexual marriage often used to define them. Evangelicals have been active in seeking increased aid for Africa, fighting poverty, battling the traffic in sex slaves, and supporting efforts to reduce global warming. Evangelicals are not just Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell and George W. Bush. They are also Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. And Haggard. And the Rev. Rick Warren, the California preacher who wrote The Purpose Driven Life, which has sold 23 million copies since 2002. And Ron Sider, founder of Evangelicals for Social Action in Wynnewood. "Evangelical does not mean any specific political ideology," said Haggard, a conservative who talks regularly with President Bush and met earlier this month in Washington with British Prime Minister Tony Blair. "I think the power base is shifting," said Haggard, who sees a new generation of leaders less bombastic and more socially active than televangelists such as Falwell and Robertson. "We think differently than the previous generation, the 1980s Moral Majority crowd." Most Americans consider religion an important part of their lives (83 percent say it is "very" or "fairly" important). But there is no consensus, even among evangelicals, on how to translate faith into action. "The vast majority in the evangelical center are regularly embarrassed by what Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson say, but they don't go around issuing press releases attacking them," said Sider, author of Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger. The National Association of Evangelicals, which represents 30 million evangelicals, last year adopted a new manifesto for social engagement, For the Health of the Nation: An Evangelical Call to Civic Responsibility, cowritten by Sider. In it, the group spells out a broad agenda: "To protect the vulnerable and poor, to guard the sanctity of human life, to further racial reconciliation and justice, to renew the family, to care for creation, and to promote justice, freedom and peace." "God measures societies by how they treat the people at the bottom," the document states. Broadly defined, evangelicals are Christians who have had a personal or "born-again" religious conversion, believe the Bible is the word of God, and believe in spreading their faith. (The term comes from Greek; to "evangelize" means to preach the gospel.) The term is typically applied to Protestants. Millions of Americans fit the definition, although estimates vary on exactly how many. Forty-two percent of Americans described themselves as evangelical Christians in a Gallup poll in April, while 22 percent said they met all three measures in a Gallup survey in May. The National Association of Evangelicals says about 25 percent of adult Americans are evangelicals. Larry Eskridge, associate director of the Institute for the Study of American Evangelicals at Wheaton College, puts the figure about 33 percent. "If you're talking about 33 percent of the population, they're not this 'other.' They're your next-door neighbor," Eskridge said. And, like many neighbors, evangelicals can be maddeningly difficult to categorize. They are Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians and other mainline Protestants, as well as Southern Baptists and members of nondenominational mega-churches. Without a uniform theology, they vary widely in interpretations of the Bible and its application to their lives and nation. With these and other strands of evangelical Christianity, "sometimes the most visible and those who shout the loudest are considered the core," said Bishop C. Milton Grannum, minister of New Covenant Church of Philadelphia, most of whose 3,000 members are African American. "But there are thousands of African American and Hispanic churches that are evangelical, and they should not feel threatened by the fact that they are not as visible." Black evangelicals are often "charismatics," a trait shared with Pentecostals and many other evangelicals. Charismatics believe the active influence of the Holy Spirit is evident in such practices as faith healing and speaking in tongues. Despite a common ground of Scripture and tradition, various evangelical congregations often inhabit parallel universes, with different priorities, experiences and politics. "There's a difference in the way we identify politically because there is a difference in the way we identify, period," said Grannum of black evangelicals. "We have had totally different experiences... . The church reflects the larger community." Edmund Gibbs, a professor at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif., said the popularity of right-wing politics is overstated. "Many of us who consider ourselves to be evangelical Christians would want to distance ourselves from that kind of alignment," said Gibbs, an Episcopalian. "And it is very much an American thing; most evangelicals in Europe would distance themselves from the politics associated with evangelicals in the United States." Haggard said his mission is to broaden the movement's base and its vision. "My role is to help the various members of the body to respect each other and work together... to make life better for everybody." Many Faces of Evangelicalism Fundamentalists: They reject the theory of evolution, believe in the literal accuracy of the Bible, regard Catholics as non-Christians, and believe in separating themselves from the secular world. They do not seek to change the culture through legislation. The number of fundamentalists "is very small," said Jonathan Pait, spokesman for Bob Jones University, a fundamentalist college in Greenville, S.C. Larry Eskridge, associate director of the Institute for the Study of American Evangelicals at Wheaton College, estimates the number at "several million." Traditionalists: They are characterized by efforts to maintain traditional beliefs and practices in the face of a changing society. Predominantly Republican (70 percent, compared with 10 percent independent and 20 percent Democrat), this group of white Protestants, with well-developed conservative political connections and ambitions, is closest to the popular notion of the "religious right." They represent about 12.6 percent of the population, or about 28 million adults, according to last year's National Survey of Religion and Politics by the Bliss Institute of the University of Akron. Centrists and modernists: They are less tradition-oriented and more willing to adapt their beliefs and practices. They are more likely to identify themselves as Democrats or independents than as Republicans. They represent about 13.7 percent of the population, according to the Bliss survey, about 30 million people. Black evangelicals: Most of the nation's 21 million black Protestants fit the evangelical definition, but their politics are the reverse of the white traditionalists: 71 percent identify themselves as Democrats and 11 percent as Republicans, according to the Bliss survey. Hispanic evangelicals: Many of the six million Hispanic Protestants are converts from Catholicism, and they skew slightly toward Democratic politics. Catholic evangelicals: This counterintuitive term identifies Roman Catholics who embrace much of the public-witness style of evangelical Protestants. "They have the fire and zeal usually associated with evangelicals," said William Portier, a religious studies professor at the University of Dayton and the author of the recent essay, "Here Come the Evangelical Catholics." Portier estimates the number of evangelical Catholics at 10 percent to 20 percent of the under-40 Catholic population.

07-26-2006, 09:03 AM	#17 (permalink)
Aladdin Sane Degenerate Location: San Marvelous	The way this issue was framed makes it more appropriate for Tilted Paranoia. Some people see the devil behind every political liberal, while others dress him up as a Christian fundamentalist who wants to destroy the environment. __________________ Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

07-26-2006, 09:49 AM	#18 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	this is becoming ridiculous really quickly. it is empirically the case that a very significant element of the populist coalition the right has assembled is geared around the chrisitan coalition and that ralph reed was fundamental to transforming this from an umbrella organization started by jerry falwell into an extremely effective grassroots political machine. it is also obviously the case that the election of extreme right republicans owes much to the efficacy of this machine. there is nothing paranoid about this--it is simply a fact. the christian coalition's success relies upon several factors: central among these is that it is routine in evangelical land to draw no clear distinction between questions of faith and questions of politics. given the deference accorded to folk who speak with some assurance on spiritual/political matters within the congregations, the effect of this blurring of lines can be kinda authoritarian if you think about it. one of the central arguments the coalition has advanced internally is that a preacher is a preacher and an independent political agent at once and that there is no need to keep the two functions separate. look for yourself--look at the coalition webpages. the christian coalition has been pretty innovative in exploiting this blurring of lines for its own ends: it publshes voter guides for each election that tell the faithful how to vote...it sponsors a range of lobbying activities and routinely generates cash that it streams toward reactionary candidates. http://www.cc.org/about.cfm the coalition has been a significant element in fashioning and enabling to function the various "wedge issues" that the right has used to generate and maintain a sense of (persecuted) separateness--the effects of which you see in nearly every thread here. it is a very large, very well-funded and politically significant group, if you want to look analytically at what remains of the right after 6 years of george w bush. one can argue with host's staging of the effects of this relationship, but you cannot do as powerclown appears to be trying to do and as aladin sane simply echoes and discount the relationship between extreme rightwing protestant evangelical/fundamentalist churches and the extreme right wing of the republican party. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

07-26-2006, 03:04 PM	#22 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	bor: i am not sure that i understand what is going on with your posts here. 1. to say that the cc "is just like any other special interest group" may be true if you assume that all interest groups have always operated as they do now--but that would be false. ralph reed--as much as i loathe the guy--is pretty slick and has in fact developed from very innovative ways to both mobilize folk and to create the impression of mobilization. the second one is linked to developing switches that enables telephone canvassers who worked on behald of the coalition to patch people directly through to their congressperson's office if they answered correctly on a series of issue-specific questions. the first is more powerful and dangerous--reed was instrumental in trying to erase any meaningful line between evangelical churches and political entities---so that it became ok for a church to use its buses to get parishoners to voting booths--after they have been coached, of course, via voter guides and the words of preachers, about which way god wanted them to act once they were inside the booths. this is new--politics and religion have not always been collapsed into each other in this way--and the christian coalition is--empirically--a basic force behind the development. 2. i dont know about you, but i think there is kind of a problem with preachers using their power within a church to tell people how god wants them to vote. seems a bit---o what's the word---authoritarian, doesnt it? and it happens. i have experienced it in my wayward youth, i know preachers who do it, the cc website encourages it...and you do not get this in catholic churches--you might get the priest telling you the church's position--but it is the churches position. god does not tell people how to vote. seems to me that if devoutly religious folk impute some authority to a preacher because they imagine him or her closer to god, or endowed with more wisdom then they are, then that preacher has alot of power--it also seems to me that telling people that god wants them to vote one way or another is an abuse of that power. but hey, maybe i just put too much stock in the illusion to separation fo church and state on the one hand, and in the idea that democracy, even in its pathetic american form, involves at some level people gathering information and making decisions on issues based on that information. 3. i get the impression that you think whenever someone uses the term christian fundamentalist that they are really dissing entire regions of the country. i dont understand this--particularly not in this particular thread, where the "bickering" (as you do nicely describe it) has mostly to do with refuting blanket statements that were initially imputed back to host, but which in the end turned out to be examples of poor argument. so i dont understand. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

07-27-2006, 05:23 AM	#23 (permalink)
Bill O'Rights will always be an Alyson Hanniganite Location: In the dust of the archives	Roachboy, roachboy, roachboy.... I think that you are reading too much into it. I don't necessarily disagree with you...I'm just coming into the room from another enterance. Let's break some of it down. The Christian Coalition has an agenda. Agreed? They need to push that agenda. Right? No matter how you feel about that agenda...they have it, and they need to push it. Remember...they are an extremely vocal minority. Now...Oh, look at that. They have a huge captive audience of maleable parishoners sitting over here, and over there, and some more over yonder. They'd be fools not to make use of that resource. Look at it, kind of like Rush Limbaugh and his merry band of "Ditto Heads". Rush may be an idiot...but he's no fool. No sirree. He's a very charasmatic, and effective motivator. He pontificates...and those that refuse to take the time to think things out, go; "Yeah! That's right! You tell 'em Rush!" Not all that much different than the clergy pounding the pulpit. In so far as the seperation of the church and state? Oh, I believe in it. Yes indeedy I do. However, I'm not so naive as to believe that it exists. Before my cute little slinky signature, I had "Freedom is that area that lies between the Church and the State". Although I believe that statement, I don't think for one moment that it exists. Now...what have we got? We've got Christian clergy pounding the pulpit, telling parishioners that the country that they love is going to go straight to hell, led by those Godless Liberals, unless...they vote for this fine upstanding Christian boy that's running for office. Is that right? Hell no! Do they have the right? Hell, yes! Although...and this is just more pie in the sky...I'd remove their tax exempt status. If the Church wants to be active in politics...let 'em and tax 'em. Can you here the cries of anguish? "But, but...were a church! We don't pay taxes. It's just unheard of". Hit 'em where it counts, roachboy. Right smack in the middle of their pocketbooks. Talk about a wailing and a gnashing of teeth. __________________ "I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony "Hedonism with rules isn't hedonism at all, it's the Republican party." - JumpinJesus It is indisputable that true beauty lies within...but a nice rack sure doesn't hurt. Last edited by Bill O'Rights; 07-27-2006 at 05:25 AM..

07-27-2006, 05:19 PM	#27 (permalink)
Seaver Junkie Location: Fort Worth, TX	Ok so that's why churches do not actively support candidates. What about religious NGOs that are actually doing the political activities?

01-18-2008, 01:04 AM	#33 (permalink)
Kpax Crazy Location: Washington	I voted "coincidence." Religion may be a variable in politics as far as members are concerned, but the only real motivator of actions, in the end, is the good ol' greenback.